John Cummings was affiliated with many institutions, but the one in which he took the most interest was the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, for which he served as treasurer between 1872 and 1889, and he was also a member of its executive committee. By a vote of the Corporation in 1889, when he retired from the office of Treasurer, Mr. Cummings' name was applied to the laboratories of Mining Engineering and Metallurgy in recognition of his services.[2]
It is also said that his great recreation was the study of Natural History and "he became so interested in that, that he was led to join the Boston Natural History Society, where he became much interested in Botany, and was chairman of the Botany section."[3]
Mr. Cummings took a great interest in his large farm in Woburn which he had bought from the heirs of his grandfather. Today his farm is kept as a public pleasure ground known as Mary Cummings Park named after his second wife who gave the farm on Babylon Hill to the City of Boston to be kept in trust "forever open as a public pleasure ground".
Cummings died at his home in Woburn on December 21, 1898.[4]
