Biography:

John L. Magee, born circa 1820 in New York, worked as an artist and lithographer in New York and Philadelphia during the mid-1800s and produced several political cartoons. In New York, Magee worked in the lithographic firms of James Baillie and Nathaniel Currier and produced illustrations for several children’s picture books during the 1840s and 1850s. From at least 1850-1852 he seems to have had his own establishment at 34 Mott Street in New York, from which he published cartoons. Magee relocated to Philadelphia at some point after 1852 and began to be listed as a lithographer in Philadelphia city directories by 1855. In Philadelphia, Magee worked as a lithographer for his own firm, which had several addresses at different times, as well as working for the publishing firms of Thomas Sinclair, Benjamin Mifflin, Frederick Pilliner, and John Hart. He was married to Anne Magee, with whom he had three children: Emma, Walter, and Howard. Although he still listed himself as a lithographer at the time of the 1870 census, he seems not to have produced lithographs after the 1860s. The year of his death is unknown