20/20 Vision : Dr. Donnell Cures Cuba City

This swell eyeglass case must have belonged to a patient of long-time Cuba City physician, Dr. J. E. (James Elmer) Donnell, who arrived in 1907 and, apart from a few absences, practiced until his death in 1939. While Dr. Donnell initially served as a general physician, he gravitated toward treating eye ailments and, as this eyeglass case suggests, pursued further training in the eye, ear, nose, and throat specialty.

J. E. Donnell, an Indiana native and former teacher, was educated first at Valparaiso University, and later at the Illinois Medical College in Chicago, where he graduated in 1907. He practiced in Benton briefly before taking over for Dr. T. L. Edwards in Cuba City. Dr. Donnell's office was located in the First National Bank building (later the Cuba City State Bank) on the corner of Clay and Main Streets, and his office sign is visible in the photograph below.

Photograph from the collection of Lillian Heitkamp Kirk.

Published in the Cuba City News-Herald (April 15, 1921).

Dr. Donnell temporarily left his practice to serve in the Army Medical Corps during World War I, and upon his return, became a charter member of Cuba City's American Legion Post.

He departed again in 1927, selling his practice to Dr. Robert E. Terry, to pursue further training in the eye, ear, nose, and throat specialty, spending time at hospitals and clinics in Philadelphia, New York City, Baltimore, and even Vienna.

Despite traveling to some glamorous locations, Donnell was drawn back to Cuba City in the 1930s and practiced as an eye, ear, nose, and throat specialist until his death from colon cancer on January 19, 1939, at the age of 63. According to Charles Bartlett, the doctor had the distinction of being the first person buried from the Bartlett Funeral Home, which would just a few years later become the Haudenshield Funeral Home.