Bob Powell Published

February 8, 1892: Cartoonist Irvin Dugan Born

Adam Goodfellow

Cartoonist Irvin Dugan was born in Huntington on February 8, 1892. He worked as a Huntington newspaper artist from 1927 until his retirement in 1957.

For many years, his “Adam Goodfellow” cartoon character was featured on the editorial pages of the Herald-Dispatch and the Sunday Herald-Advertiser.

Adam was a wrinkled little man with a handlebar mustache and corncob pipe. Dugan created him during World War II to promote the sale of war bonds. In his first appearance, Adam was shown with a dinner pail under his arm, a newly purchased war bond in hand, and a caption that read, “Here’s mine. Where’s yours?” The U.S. Treasury Department distributed the cartoon nationwide, and it was widely reprinted. Even after the war, Adam kept crusading for various causes.

Many well-known individuals, including coal mine labor leader John L. Lewis and Presidents Franklin D. Roosevelt and Harry Truman wrote Dugan asking for originals of his cartoons.

In 1974, Dugan donated a collection of such letters and 500 original drawings of Adam to Marshall University. After retiring, Irvin Dugan moved to Phoenix, Arizona, where he died in 1982 at age 90.