Henry N. Cady
BiographyHenry Newell Cady (July 8, 1849–May 15, 1935) was an American artist, author, and illustrator of magazines and books (sometimes under the pseudonym Wallace P. Stanley). Among his other talents were composing piano music and photography.
He was born in Warren, Rhode Island, the first born of four to Warren High School’s first principal, Isaac Foote Cady, and his wife, Clementine Lee Cady. Largely self-taught as an artist, he was an 1869 graduate of Brown University and briefly attended the National Academy of Design in New York. During his lifetime his work was displayed at the 1893 Chicago World’s Fair, the St. Louis Exposition of 1904, and the Expostion of American Artists in Springfield, Massachusetts. His paintings were mostly of New England coastal scenes in a luminist style inspired by the Hudson River School.
On Christmas Day 1872 he married Annie Cole (1850–1911), daughter of Thomas Cole. The Coles were a prominent Warren family, well-connected to the town’s extensive mariner and ship building history, itself interwined with the whaling industry as well as the brutal triangular slave trade. Together Henry and Annie had three children: two sons, Lawrence and Henry (also known by his middle name, Dewees), and a daughter, Alice. Unable to support his growing family, he moved his family out of Warren in 1883, first to South Orange, New Jersey, then to Germantown, Pennsylvannia, and later to Philadelphia. Throughout this time he made a living as a photo-engraver. Annie also had an active career as an author of predominantly children’s literature. In 1895 Cady returned to Warren with his family, where he would remain for the rest of his days. He was remarked to be a quiet, unassuming person who preferred to let his artistic works speak for him.
Bibliography (wildly incomplete)
Down the Bay; or, Joe and I on Salt Water (as Wallace P. Stanley, author and illustrator, 1890)
The American Continent and Its Inhabitants Before Its Discovery by Columbus by Annie Cole Cady (illustrator, 1891)
Our Week Afloat; or, How We Explored the Pequonset River (as Wallace P. Stanley, author and illustrator, 1893)
The Prince of the House of David by J. H. Ingraham (illustrator, revised edition, 1898)
Images of America: Warren by Ruth Marris Macauley and John Chaney (contributor, 1997)
Other links
FindAGrave.com
George Hail Free Library