Staff Reports
GREENFIELD — A local author, Donna Griffin, recently released a children’s book, a collaboration with Indianapolis Star cartoonist Gary Varvel.
“Old Whiskers Escapes!” tells the true story of President Benjamin Harrison’s pet goat that lived on the White House grounds, according to a news release. The goat was often spotted taking the president’s grandchildren on wagon rides on the lawn, but one day escaped with Grandson Baby McKee in tow. Harrison, upon discovering the goat was missing, went running down Pennsylvania Avenue in hot pursuit, his top hat in one hand and cane in the other.
The story offers readers surprising insight into Indiana’s only president, the popularity of presidential pets at the White House during the 19th century, and the enduring relationships between grandparents and their grandchildren — regardless of grandpa’s station in life, according to a news release. Written by Donna Griffin and illustrated by Gary Varvel, the book includes four pages of historical sidebars, including primary sources documenting the goat’s adventure, facts about presidential pets and information about the Benjamin Harrison Presidential Site in Indianapolis, a museum home that tells the life story of America’s centennial president.
Both the author and illustrator have local ties, according to a news release.
Griffin lives in Greenfield. She has been a writer, editor, and teacher for more than 30 years. A native Hoosier, she served as editor and general manager of the Times-Post weekly newspaper in Pendleton, and also worked at newspapers in Central Indiana for 16 years, owning and operating her own weekly newspaper. She is president and CEO of Dani’s Dreams Innovation in Education Corp., a media education non-profit that provides young people of all ages a chance to “Create, Explore, Discover,” and she works as Student Publications Adviser at Arsenal Technical High School in Indianapolis.
Varvel won his first cartoon contest during his freshman year at Danville High School. Soon, he was fulfilling a career dream and becoming a cartoonist at The Indianapolis Star. Varvel has won many national cartooning awards including: the 2012 National Headliners Award, the 2011 Robert F. Kennedy Journalism Award, the 2010 National Cartoonists Society Reuben Award, and the 2010 Grambs Aronson Award for Cartooning with a Conscience. In 2015, Varvel was inducted into the Indiana Journalism Hall of Fame.
