Dorothy McPhaul, owner of longtime East Austin antiques shop, has died at age 90

Dorothy McPhaul, whose small East Austin antique shop has survived for generations despite intense building development around it, died at home on Oct. 16 at age 90.

Despite not infrequent offers to buy the corner property at East Sixth and San Marcos streets, McPhaul always refused.

"I'm going to hang on to it," McPhaul told the American-Statesman in 2019 in reference to Johnnie's Antiques and Collectibles. "It would be like giving my body away. It's part of me, a part of my heritage. My parents worked too hard to keep it, and it's a part of our legacy, that shop."

Her family, whose antiquing days go back to 1918, plans to keep the shop open for now.

"My family is committed to preserving my grandmother's legacy — indeed, our family legacy," said granddaughter Alex Overton-Johnson. "This commitment involves respecting her wishes. With my father, Tanny Overton, and myself being the most invested in the antique business, our plan is to pick up where she left off."

Growing up in East Austin

Born Sept. 14, 1933, in Austin, McPhaul was the daughter of father Augusta Singleton, who lived in New York during McPhaul's youth, and mother Ilesta Singleton, who pursued a college education and worked for some of the city's most politically situated families. Singleton tended the family antiques store until her death.

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McPhaul and her four siblings grew up at 1511 Hackberry and attended segregated East Austin schools as well as Greater Mt. Zion Baptist Church. She studied physical therapy and physical education at what is now Prairie View A&M University, then taught school for 38 years, commuting to and from La Grange before retiring in 1994 to take care of her mother.

“I taught physical education and coached basketball, volleyball, the cheerleaders and the drill team,” she said. “You weren’t paid for all this extracurricular coaching. Just the men coaches got paid.”

McPhaul had three children with her first husband, Fred Overton, who was related to Austin civil rights pioneer Volma Overton Sr. and military veteran Richard Overton, who died in 2018 at the age of 112. Her second husband was Willis Calvin "W.C." McPhaul, who worked as a maitre d' at the Driskill Hotel. He died in 2021.

“President Johnson wanted him to be his White House maitre d',” McPhaul said. “Whenever President Johnson came to town, he’d go out to the ranch and bartend.”

McPhaul leaves behind children Pamela Holt, Frederick Overton and Tanny Overton. They produced six grandchildren, who added several great-grandchildren.

Collecting and selling antiques part of a long family tradition

“When our first shop opened in 1918, it was just a little shack then,” McPhaul told the American-Statesman. “Papa — my grandfather Simon Sidle — was a horse trader. He’d train the horses. He’d go out to these places and sometimes make a trade for antiques. A lot of his customers said he could get anything out of a house. You could never grab him with what was on a table outside.”

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McPhaul’s aunt Theresa Sidle kept up the antiques business.

“She took over right after he passed,” McPhaul said. “She was known as ‘queen of antiques,’ and the shop, Theresa and Tannie’s, was at East 11th and Red River streets. When school was out, they’d go on shopping trips, state to state, and I’d take over the shop. I was deep into it before that, back when my grandfather was there. I’d want to go to the movies on Saturday. I knew just where to get money. I’d touch everything in the place, and he gave me money to get rid of me.”

The current antiques shop opened in the 1970s. McPhaul was the one who discovered the building that had been a cleaners and a law office. She followed her mother’s and aunt’s interests in Black memorabilia, despite the outright racism of some of the images that depict African Americans in stereotypes.

“It’s a part of history,” McPhaul said. “A lot of times, it’s offensive to a lot of Blacks, but you can't erase the past. These creatures don't look anything like me. I don't care how offensive they are; they will always be part of history.”

The legacy of antiques abides

Granddaughter Alex Overton-Johnson shares her grandmother's entrepreneurial spirit.

"Over the years, our relationship transformed into a deep friendship," Overton-Johnson said upon her death, "my grandma became my best friend. We were like twins from different generations, sharing strikingly similar interests and an 'I can do it myself' attitude. Also both of us being passionate about shopping, having a keen eye for fashion, a love for rare finds, and a strong desire to collect and preserve items of historical significance."

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Overton-Johnson helped McPhaul reopen Johnnie's Antiques once a week after the worst of the pandemic was over.

"My goal was to reignite her brain and exercise her memory to keep her active because she always told me: 'When you stop working that's when you get old,'" Overton-Johnson said. "So, we'd work on Wednesdays from noon to 4 p.m., and then we would use our slower moments trading business ideas.

"Her presence was calming and comforting to me. Now, as I find myself grappling with a new reality — one where my grandma is no longer here — it means the world to me that I had the privilege of sharing so many remarkable moments with her."

During the decades on East Sixth Street, McPhaul looked after the neighborhood regulars, including people who experienced homelessness, as well as curious tourists. She commissioned a welcoming mural for the east side of her shop.

“I always wanted to put something there,” McPhaul said. “A young man said he would paint the people whom President Trump told to go back where they came from. One is Spanish, another is a Muslim, another is Jewish. Small Black businesses belong up there with all these nationalities. So that’s my mother, my aunt and my grandfather.”

The words painted on the mural: “We all belong here.”

A memorial will be held at noon Oct. 24 at Greater Mt. Zion Church at 4301 Tannehill Lane.

Corrections: In a previous version of this post, the names of Ilesta Singleton, Alex Overton-Johnson, Tanny Overton and Theresa and Tannie's shop were misspelled.