Homer Davenport
Homer Calvin Davenport (born March 8, 1867 in the Waldo Hills near Silverton (Oregon) , † May 2, 1912 ) was an American cartoonist.
His collaboration with William Randolph Hearst made him the most influential political cartoonist in America of his day. Its main character was Davvy . Davenport was instrumental in the election of the presidential candidate Theodore Roosevelt in 1904.
Life
Homer Davenport was a son of Timothy Woodbridge Davenport and his wife Florinda Willard Geer. Although he lost his mother at an early age, she had a formative influence on the child. During her pregnancy, she became enthusiastic about the caricatures by the cartoonist Thomas Nast in Harper's Weekly magazine . Influenced by Russell Trall's treatise How to Born a Genius , she followed a certain diet and focused her thoughts on how her son would later become an equally successful draftsman. Children's drawings of horses and pigs that Homer Davenport made on the Geers farm have been preserved.
In 1870 a leaf epidemic broke out in the community . She also met the Davenports family. Homer Davenport's face was disfigured by the disease, and the disease was fatal for his mother. She left the prophecy to her husband:
“You must take another wife, but… my prophecy… my dream… my little son will be a cartoonist. Give him every opportunity. "
When Homer Davenport was seven years old, his father moved him to Silverton. Well educated himself and with many interests, he only urged Homer to study and draw faces. The book The Country Boy , published in 1910, is a fitting picture of this stage in Davenport's life. However, while this book was actually commercially available, albeit not well marketed, the title The Belle of Silverton, and Other Oregon Stories (1888-1889) , which Davenport later listed himself on his list of works, turned out to be a pure invention . The book apparently never existed.
As a young man, Homer Davenport took on odd jobs. He was a jockey in Salem and a clown in McMahon's circus, which may have led to the evolution of the Republican elephant and Tammany tiger characters invented by Thomas Nast. An attempt to graduate from Armstrong Business School in Portland, Oregon , failed.
He worked for the railroad for a long time. From this phase comes a wall drawing showing his bull terrier Duffy . Davenport drew this dog portrait on the wall of a freight terminal in West Stayton . When this building went up in flames, the picture was saved by the fire department .
Around 1890, Homer Davenport drew the steamship Harvest Queen for The Oregonian , but received no payment for it. In 1891 he was commissioned by the Portland Sunday Mercury to draw a fight between Jack Dempsey and Bob Fitzsimmons in New Orleans . The 21 pictures are lost today.
In 1892 his father sent him to San Francisco to attend art school. One of his relatives gave him a letter of recommendation, which resulted in his starting work for the San Francisco Examiner on a weekly wage of $ 2.50 . The paper belonged to William Randolph Hearst's empire. Davenport also briefly worked for The Chronicle .
On behalf of the Chicago Daily Herald , Davenport was allowed to visit the World's Fair in Chicago in 1893 . He soon married Daisy Moor and got a $ 75 weekly job with the Chronicle. The portrait of Sam Rainey , which took up the front page of the examiner, falls during this period .
In 1895 Davenport was summoned to New York City along with Arthur Brisbane . Evening Journal sales began to rise; Davenport was now a sought-after draftsman and made a lot of money. At times his income reached $ 25,000 a year, the equivalent of the President of the United States' earnings at the time. Hearst used Davenport's drawings to outrun competitor Joseph Pulitzer . Davenport was less popular with the victims of his pointed pen, politicians and business leaders alike: in 1897 Senator Thomas Platt tried to enforce an anti-cartoon bill that was supposed to prevent anyone from being portrayed in public against his will and without prior insight into the cartoon. He did not succeed, however, and was just another reason for Davenport to make a critical drawing.
Eventually Hearst tried to run for the presidency but was unsuccessful. During this time Davenport met Theodore Roosevelt. Deeply impressed by his personality, Davenport left Hearst at the New York Journal in mid-1903 and began working for the Republican Party and its presidential candidate. He received $ 1,000 a week for this and created a successful election poster: Uncle Sam puts his hand on Roosevelt's shoulder and confirms: "He's good enough for me."
Davenport as a horse breeder
After separating from Hearst, Davenport first moved his family to East Orange, New Jersey , and later to the Davenport Estate , a stud in Morris Plains . Davenport received a letter of recommendation to the Sultan of Turkey from Theodore Roosevelt after his election . In this way he got permission to transport Arab horses from their region of origin to the USA. Davenport, who also kept numerous other animals, was fascinated by these horses from childhood. His father had told him stories about the Bedouins. He later saw several Arabs at the Chicago World's Fair. After learning that these animals had been sold after the exhibition, he went looking for them and bought one from Peter Bradley . In 1904 he imported an Arab stallion from Great Britain and in 1906 he undertook his journey to the Anazeh Bedouins , from which he brought back 27 pure-blooded Arabs and extensive pictorial material. His stud farm was lavishly furnished and visited by stars of his time, including Buffalo Bill , Lillian Russell and John L. Sullivan . The Arabs he kept here provided important blood for American thoroughbred breeding. The stallion Haleb won the Morgan Cup in 1907. In 1909, Davenport's beloved animal was probably poisoned.
Marital problems and death
Davenport's marriage to his wife Daisy was unhappy and in 1909 he suffered a nervous crisis. Albert Goodwill Spalding showed him the way to San Diego , where he should relax again. He was supported by the theosophist Catherine Tingley , and in a three-page article in the San Diego Sun of February 3, 1910, he wrote the burden off his mind. His wife Daisy was replaced by a mistress named Zadah. In the same year he published the Country Boy . Thereupon he received a telegram from Hearst: Dear Davvy: Come home. Hearst.
One of his first assignments after returning to work for Hearst was to paint a picture of the sinking of the Titanic . Davenport represented a giant hand pulling the ship underwater.
After Davenport lost his father in 1911, was embroiled in the war of divorce, and instead of focusing on fulfilling Hearst's assignment, Davenport suffered a nervous breakdown. For convalescence he went to the home of a Mrs. Cochran, known in spiritualist circles as Assonath Neypa. There he died of pneumonia at the age of 45.
Davenport was buried next to his father in Silverton. His gravestone bears the inscription Erected by his friends to the Memory of Oregon's world-renowned cartoonist on the front . On the back there is a picture that Davenport drew on the occasion of his father's death. It shows a man in an angel's carriage looking back at Silverton.
Film and festival
A film was made about Davenport as early as 1900. His title is Homer Davenport, the Cartoonist . A festival called Homer Davenport Days is held in Silverton every August in honor of Davenport.
Works
- Cartoons , 1898
- The Dollar or the Man , 1900
- My Quest of the Arabian Horse , BW Dodge & Company, New York, 1909
- The Country Boy , GW Dillingham Company, New York, 1910
literature
- Leland Huot and Alfred Powers, Homer Davenport of Silverton , West Shore Press, Bingen, Washington, 1973.
- Mickey Hickman, Homer: The Country Boy , Capital City Graphics, Salem, Oregon, 1986.
Web links
Individual evidence
- ^ A b Walt Curtis: Homer Davenport - Oregon's Great Cartoonist , Oregon Cultural Heritage Commission. Accessed November 13, 2009
- ↑ Archive link ( Memento of the original dated November 12, 2009 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.
- ↑ http://www.geocities.com/Heartland/Estates/3095/WonDav.html ( Memento from August 3, 2004 in the Internet Archive )
- ↑ http://www.horseracing.com/horses/haleb/
- ↑ http://www.imdb.de/title/tt0322586/
| personal data | |
|---|---|
| SURNAME | Davenport, Homer |
| ALTERNATIVE NAMES | Davenport, Homer Calvin |
| BRIEF DESCRIPTION | American draftsman and caricaturist and horse breeder |
| DATE OF BIRTH | March 8, 1867 |
| PLACE OF BIRTH | Waldo Hills near Silverton, Oregon |
| DATE OF DEATH | May 2, 1912 |