What sort of successful business men, absorbed with their own affairs and yet finding time to serve their fellow-citizens in offices of public trust, may spring forth in Pomona Valley, is well illustrated in the life and interesting career of William Clyde Doughty, himself the son of a former office holder who was widely-esteemed in his day. He was born at Keokuk, Iowa, on October 17, 1871, and his father was William G. Doughty, who was born in Kentucky but reared in Illinois. He was a teacher in Iowa, later removing to Kansas, where he both farmed and conducted a flour mill. In 1890 he came to La Verne, Cal., and set himself up as a merchant, and for six years he was postmaster under President Cleveland. He purchased raw land, developed water and set out an orange grove. May 9, 1906, he died, mourned by many. He had married, in Keokuk, Iowa, Martha J. Yenawine, a native of Illinois, and she is now living in Los Angeles, the mother of seven children. Charles H. lives in Los Angeles; W. Clyde is the subject of our interesting review; Helen M. has become Mrs. F. G. Kimball; Grace is the wife of C. W. Tucker; and there are Paul E., and Maude and Harry, twins. In his first year his parents moved from Keokuk to what became Galva, McPherson County, Kans., where he was reared and educated in the public and high schools.
In 1890 Mr. Doughty came to La Verne, Cal., and since that time he has followed the orange industry and the real-estate business. He helped to pick the first carload of fruit taken from the Richards ranch in North Pomona, and for two years he was foreman of the old Ruddich & Trench Packing House, at La Verne. He himself owns a fine orange grove of fifteen acres in full bearing, all free from debt, one-half of the trees being Valencias, the other half Navels, that he improved, and if anyone wishes to see a small "show place" reflecting creditably on the Valley, he need not go further than this citrus property.
Mr. Doughty has also been one of the leading real-estate dealers in the Valley for years, and has been most successful in the large sales of orange groves and alfalfa ranches, for which he maintains an office at La Verne and operates throughout the Valley. To know Mr. Doughty is to wish to do business with him; and it has been this confidence in his honesty and judgment that has laid the foundation for his business success. Besides having been president of the Board of Trade of La Verne for two years, he served as a grammar school trustee for nine years, and as a trustee of the high school for six; was clerk of the school board for years, and is now, as he has been for the past four years, city clerk of the town of La Verne, and is a member of the La Verne Orange Growers Association.
When, on July 7, 1897, Mr. Doughty was married at La Verne to Miss Grace Myers, a daughter of D. L. and Mary Myers of Kansas, who were also early settlers of La Verne, commenced that domestic, happy life made still brighter by the advent of two children, Glenn and Ruby. Since then he has built a fine home costing $6,000; and as an enterprising, prosperous man of affairs, he has constructed and still owns other desirable houses in La Verne.
History of Pomona Valley, California, with Biographical Sketches
of The Leading Men and Women of the Valley Who Have Been
Identified With Its Growth and Development from the Early Days
to the Present
Published in Los Angeles, Cal., by the Historic Record Company
1920
Transcribed by Linda Jackson 11/09/08, Pages 680-681
Los Angeles County Biographies ~ Archive Biography Index ~ Archive Index
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