Donahey brothers were well known in the region
Hal Donahey
The creative talents of the Donahey brothers, James Harrison (Hal) and William, were well-known to readers of newspapers nationally during the first half of the 20th century.
It was their artistry — along with the assistance of older brother Alvin “Vic,” who became three-time governor of Ohio and a U.S. senator — that led to the founding of the Unitile Company, which operated in Uhrichsville and New Philadelphia from 1917-27.
According to the Cleveland Encyclopedia, Hal Donahey was born April 8, 1875, to John Coulter and Catherine Chaney Donahey of West Chester, Tuscarawas County.
He began his newspaper experience with New Philadelphia’s local paper, The Ohio Democrat, prior to coming to Cleveland to study at the Cleveland School of Art. In 1896 he found employment as an illustrator for the Cleveland World newspaper and later began drawing for the Plain Dealer on Jan. 1, 1900, a position he would hold for the most part until his death on June 1, 1949.
During the Cleveland mayoral campaign of 1907, Donahey won an artists’ duel with rival Cleveland newspaper political artist Homer Davenport, whom the Cleveland Leader borrowed from New York to battle Mayor Tom L. Johnson. On April 23, 1910, Donahey published his most famous cartoon, marking the death of Mark Twain, depicting two somber boys rafting a flower-draped bier “Down the River.”
Combining work with his love of travel, Donahey provided the Cleveland Plain Dealer with pictorial accounts of such diverse locales as Egypt and Alaska.
Donahey also was active in community affairs, receiving the Cleveland Community Fund’s Distinguished Service Award in 1938. After his first wife, Beatrice, died in 1939, Donahey married Josephine Rhodes, a widow.
He had one stepdaughter, K.M. Haber, but no children of his own. After the 1920s, he lived on a farm in Aurora, dying shortly after a debilitating stroke.
Donahey is buried in the East Avenue Cemetery in New Philadelphia.
At the Stockwell House, found at 933 Center St. in Ashland, many Unitile examples exist. As described by the Center Street Historic Association, the English revival home was built in 1922 for $40,000 by John Stockwell, a founder of the Home Company, now known as the Essex House.
In 1932 the Stockwell House was sold to stone quarry operator Robert Hayne and his wife Glenna. They later sold to real estate agents Adam and Virgil Gaines in 1939. It was Edna Castor and Sam and Virginia Donley who bought the home in 1959, and in 1990 their daughter Dotty and son-in-law Bud became the current owners.
In the entry foyer of the Stockwell House, a welcoming cartoon tile, perpendicular to the front door, faces approaching guests. The tile was a Unitile scene designed by Donahey. Another signed comical Donahey Unitile is to the right of the fireplace.
Brother William Donahey’s career as an artist was equally noteworthy. Born Oct. 19, 1883, William Donahey graduated from college in 1903 and joined brother Hal at the Cleveland Plain Dealer.
While working for the paper, he met his future wife, Mary Augusta Dickerson — a New York City native who was a columnist and children’s book author.
Mary Donahey encouraged her husband to illustrate traditional children’s stories including the Mother Goose rhymes. These efforts caught the eye of Joseph Medill Patterson, the editor of the Chicago Tribune.
Patterson hired William Donahey to draw for the comics section of the newspaper. It was during this time William Donahey created the iconic Teenie Weenies strip, which was loosely based on Jonathan Swift’s villagers of Lilliput in “Gulliver’s Travels,” first published in 1726.
Teenie Weenies first appeared in black and white in the Tribune on June 14, 1912. The strip depicting a tiny family that lived beneath a rose bush next to full-sized objects like hats, jugs and old boots appeared in color in 1923 and ran in the Sunday comics until William Donahey’s death on Feb. 1, 1970.
It was William Donahey’s depiction of an English fox hunt that became a Unitile painting on a mantle of a Tudor-style arch cast stone fireplace in the billiard room of the Barder House, located at 1041 W. Market St. in Akron.
The house, designed by Harpster and Bliss in 1919, was originally owned by Bryon Barder, who ran a boiler company in downtown Akron. Currently occupied by Braun & Steidl Architects, the house is listed on the National Register of Historic Places.