Tom Hemphill, long-time Chestnut Hill resident, former Naval reservist, advertising agency “magician” (according to his closest co-worker) and copywriter, political junkie, television director, cartoonist, former Chestnut Hill Community Association board member, talented tennis player and swimmer and instructor for blind sculptors at Allens Lane Art Center, died peacefully of natural causes on May 8 at the age of 93.
“Tom was magical,” said John Crane, who worked with Hemphill from 1984 to 1988 at the Kalish & Rice Advertising Agency (later Earl Palmer Brown) in Center City. “He was creative director, and I was the account supervisor. I worked with him on the PECO and First Pennsylvania Bank accounts. He was so terrific to work with. Very funny, made me laugh all the time.”
Crane, who remained friends with Hemphill, added, “We worked together with Richard Snowden for the Bowman Properties account in Chestnut Hill. Much later, during COVID, we had dinner every other Sunday. Tom really understood TV. He was the best presenter of TV commercials I have ever seen, before or since.”
Thomas Nelson Hemphill was born in 1931 in Des Moines, Iowa, and graduated from Drake University with a degree in journalism and fine art. Hemphill and his first wife, Kay, were married for 30 years. They had three daughters — Lisa McGill, Susan Joy Hemphill and Betsey Gagliano — all while living in Des Moines.
Hemphill was an only child. According to family members, his parents were in their late 30s when he was born. He had a very humble upbringing during the Great Depression. His grandfather had a turkey farm, and his father was a car salesman, an appliance salesman, and a “pharmacist without a degree,” which was possible in those days in some small towns and rural areas. Tom was the first in his family to graduate from college and also served in the Navy Reserve in his early 20s.
After college, Hemphill got a job at KRNT-TV in Des Moines and after a while became director of a Friday night talk show. In that job he met several famous political figures, including John and Robert Kennedy when they were campaigning in Iowa, which leaned Democrat at the time. He eventually left the station to work in the advertising business, for which the extrovert was ideally suited. In 1969, he moved his family to Baltimore to take a job with an advertising agency, W.B. Doner.
McGill, who now lives in Baltimore, told the Local, “When we were in Iowa, dad knew he had to move to the East Coast, where the major advertising agencies were. My mom, who died a couple years ago, and dad were together till I was 24. He was a typical dad in the 1960s. I don't mean that in a critical way. But he put in long hours working, and there were definite male and female roles. But he was always a fun, joking dad with a great sense of humor. And I can still picture him sweating while mowing the lawn and doing the barbecues in the 1960s.
“He was so into politics,” she said. “In election years we watched all the political conventions on TV. He played tennis well and was a great swimmer and diver. In the mid-'70s he stopped smoking and dedicated himself to a healthy lifestyle, jogging for decades. But he really liked being a copywriter and a director of writers. He understood the craft so well.”
In the early 1980s, Hemphill moved to Philadelphia to take a job at Kalish & Rice, where he worked with major clients, such as PECO, Wawa, and Strawbridge & Clothier department stores.
Hemphill met second wife, Susan, a copywriter, while both worked at W.B. Doner, although they came to Philadelphia independently. Susan told the Local, “Tom did public service spots for the National Guard in Baltimore. He wrote the famous one that said 'When you do drugs over there (Europe), you are in for the hassle of your life.'
“And one of Tom's accounts was Roy Rogers Restaurants. He met Roy in person, and Roy invited him to his ranch in California to shoot bottles for target practice.”
Susan and Tom were married for almost 40 years and lived in Chestnut Hill for the past 30. “Tom was a loyal Democrat and was proud of the fact that he met John, Bobby and Teddy Kennedy,” Susan said. “Tom had taken a photo of Bobby and sent a copy of it to Ethel [Bobby's widow] after the assassination. Later we went to the John F. Kennedy Presidential Library and Museum in Boston, and we saw that photo on the second floor.
The couple ran their own copywriting company after Hemphill retired, called Red Dot Radio. It lasted 10 years, and the pair wrote TV and print ads.
Hemphill is survived by wife Susan, his three daughters, and grandchildren Meghan Esquivel, Caitlin Sprouse, Sarah Gagliano, Thomas Joseph Gagliano, and great-grandchildren Hadley, Rory, and Dawson Sprouse and Maizie Butcher.
Those who wish to make a donation in Hemphill's memory are urged to consider Keystone Hospice in Wyndmoor, Brenda's Cat Rescue, or a local nonprofit arts organization. His family will hold a memorial celebration of Hemphill's life at a later date.
Len Lear can be reached at lenlear@chestnuthilllocal.com.
