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CHARLES L. DAUGHERTY
Vol. 3 pg. 951

Among the well known and honored citizens given to Oklahoma by the
Lone Star State is the present efficient and valued incumbent of the
office of State Commissioner of Labor. Mr. DAUGHERTY has wielded
large influence in connection with the conditions and influences that
compass the productive factors in the great domain of industry, has
been prominent in connecting with newspaper enterprise, and his broad
experience as a practical printer, as an editor and publisher and as
an exponent of the cause of labor has admirably qualified him for the
responsible and important office which he now holds.

Mr. Daugherty was born in Denton County, Texas, on the 13th day of
July, 1873, and is a son of Christopher C. and Nancy J. (LOVEJOY)
Daugherty, the former of whom was born in Texas County, Missouri, on
the 22nd of October, 1832, and the latter of whom was born in the
State of Texas, where her father was an honored and prominent
pioneer, as will be noted in detail in a later paragraph.

Christopher C. Daugherty was reared and educated in his native state
and there continued to reside until 1851, when he settled in Denton
County, Texas, and became one of the pioneer merchants in that
section of the state. He assisted in the organization of the country,
served as its sheriff in the early days and later as tax assessor,
and was otherwise prominent and influential in civic affairs of a
local order. At the time of the Civil war he gave valiant service as
a soldier of the Confederacy in a Texas regiment command by Colonel
MORSE and assigned to the command of General CABELL. In addition to
his mercantile interests he became a successful farmer and stock
grower in Denton County, where he continued to reside until his
death, on the 9th of February, 1912, and where his wife died May 23,
1913.

Mrs. Nancy J. (Lovejoy) Daugherty was a daughter of Rev. John L.
Lovejoy, who was a pioneer minister of the Methodist Church in Texas,
his earnest labors as a preacher of the gospel having covered a
period of many years, though he was not formally licensed as a
clergyman until he was seventy-three years of age. In 1835, the year
prior to the organization of the Republic of Texas, he there
established his home, upon his removal from Arkansas. He was a native
of North Carolina and as a young man served as a Government Indian
scout on the western frontier. From his native state Mr. Lovejoy went
to Mississippi, whence he later removed to Arkansas, and in Texas he
established his home at Blossom Prairie, Lamar County, where he
became a merchant and farmer, to him having come the distinction of
having sold the first merchandise in what is now the thriving Town of
McKinney, Texas. He later moved to Denton, where he again embarked in
the merchant business. In 1838 Mr. Lovejoy organized the first
Methodist Church in Northern Texas and effected the erection of its
pioneer edifice at Clarksville. He attained to venerable age and was
one of the well known and revered pioneer citizens of Denton, Texas,
at the time of his death, in 1885, his age at the time having been
eighty-five years. He was a member of the Lovejoy family that was
prominent in the banking and mercantile business in the Lone Star
State in the early days.

At Denton, Texas, the present Commissioner of Labor of the State of
Oklahoma acquired his early education in the public schools, and
there also he served as apprenticeship to the printer's trade, in the
office of a local newspaper. In 1890 he found employment at his trade
in the City of Fort Worth, and as a journeyman printer he gained wide
and varied experience, having thereafter been employed at this trade
at Paris, San Antonio, Victoria and Brownsville, Texas, as well as in
the Republic of Mexico and in Central America. In 1896 Mr. Daugherty
came to Oklahoma Territory and located at Ardmore, Carter County, but
in the following year he became associated with others in
establishing and publishing the Muskogee Morning Times, in the City
of Muskogee, where he remained until February, 1899, when he returned
to Denton, Texas. From July of that year until 1902 he was one of the
editors and publishers of the Denton County News, and in the latter
year he came again to Oklahoma, where he engaged in the general
merchandise business at Shawnee. In the spring of the following year,
however, he removed to Oklahoma City where he continued in the employ
of the Western Newspaper Union until August, 1906, when he became
foreman in the office of the Oklahoma Morning Post . Of this position
he continued in tenure until Oklahoma was admitted to statehood, in
1907, when he was elected the first incumbent of the office of State
Commissioner of Labor, which office he has since continued to hold,
through re-election in 1910.

In January, 1915, Governor WILLIAMS appointed him a member of the
State Board of Public Affairs, and his service to the state has been
marked by ability, circumspection, loyalty and an earnest effort to
conserve the best interests of the people. When he assumed the office
of State Commissioner of Labor the Oklahoma statute books had no laws
pertaining to matters normally within the jurisdiction of this
office, and he was specially instrumental through his assistance to
the legislative committee of the State Federation of Labor in
preparing and procuring the enactment of consistent labor laws. As
commissioner he put forth most zealous and effective efforts to
obtain legislative enactment touching the matters of employers'
liability and workmen's compensation, and in his fifth annual report
as Commissioner of Labor he gave a through exploitation of this
important matter and urged with marked force and consistency the
passage of laws similar to those relative to these provisions on the
part of other states of the Union.

Mr. Daugherty has been a member of the Typographical Union since
1890 and has held every local office in the same. In 1904-5 he was
president and secretary of the Oklahoma City Trade Council, and he
has been a vigorous and earnest advocate of the cause and legitimate
demands of organized labor, though never bigoted or intolerant in his
views. Mr. Daugherty is a director of the Arkansas River Bed Oil and
Gas Company, which is capitalized for $250,000, which owns valuable
holding in the petroleum and gas fields of Oklahoma, and which
operates successful producing wells.

In a fraternal way he is affiliated with Oklahoma City Lodge No. 36,
Ancient Free and Accepted Masons; Elm Lodge No. 51, Knights of
Pythias, at Denton, Texas; Oklahoma City Lodge 417, Benevolent and
Protective Order of Elks; Camp No. 15 of the Woodmen of the World at
Denton, Texas and Oklahoma City Camp No. 6892, Modern Woodmen of
America. Both he and his wife hold membership in the Methodist
Episcopal Church South, and his political allegiance is given to the
democratic party.

In 1901 was solemnized the marriage of Mr. Daugherty to Miss Alberta
MITCHELL, daughter of Robert R. Mitchell, a representative citizen
and lumber merchant at Denton Texas, and two children of this union
are Philip E. who was born March 12, 1904, and Frederick A., who was
born August 18, 1914. The family home in Oklahoma City is at 1115
North Central Avenue.

Typed for OKGenWeb by Vickie Neill Taylor January 3, 1999.