The Louis Albert Daugherty Building

SOUTH MOLALLA AVENUE GROUP

The Molalla Paint Store

123 South Molalla Avenue

1912 – 1942

By Gail J. McCormick

The Louis Albert Daugherty Building is located on the northeast corner of South Molalla Avenue and Second Street.  The address is 123 South Molalla Avenue.  The historical references date the building at 1902.  It is commercial and the architectural style is Western False Front.  Until the summer of 2017, it still had the original front windows.  On the very lower part of the front of the building, you can see some of the original siding.  The original color was blue.

 

The building's original purpose was most likely as a grocery store.  The right half of the building is the original part and is two-story.  Later, a lean-to was added to the left side.  At some time, a second story was added to the lean-to.  The western false front was extended, making the building look complete.  In the 1980's, the building was converted to apartments and it serves that purpose through today.

 

Louis Albert Daugherty

The first known business in the building was The Molalla Paint Store, owned and operated by Louis Albert    Daugherty.  Louis took up the occupation of painter around 1902, when he was 24 years old.  He opened The Molalla Paint Store in 1912, a year before the town incorporated.  An ad in the first Molalla Pioneer newspaper, dated March 7, 1913, states "Your house is crying for paint.  You can't afford to refuse it.  It needs good paint, we have it; good workmanship, we do it."  Besides operating the store, Louis had a crew of painters who painted many of the new homes being built around this time.  They included the Molalla State Bank Building, the residences of Levi Wayne and Everman Robbins, Dr. Todd's residence and the Tobin building.

 

Louis Albert Daugherty was born August 10, 1879, at Molalla, Oregon.  His father and mother were Charles William Daugherty and Mary Eliza Sawtell Daugherty.  Father Charles and grandfather and grandmother, Giles and Polly Doak Daugherty, traversed the Oregon Trail in 1852, when Charles was four years old.  It was a traumatic journey for the family as the mother, Polly, died as a result of the hardships of the journey.  She was buried in the area that is now Wyoming.

 

Louis grew up in Molalla, Oregon, one of five boys born to Charles and Mary.  The Daugherty’s were farmers and the five boys enjoyed growing up in the country.  It appears that Louis never married.  A brief article in the Molalla Pioneer stated that he had his cottage painted in 1913.  The census for 1920 lists him, at home, on Main Street between Engle Street and Third, with his occupation simply “painter”.  On the 1940 census, he lists his occupation as "owner of paint and decorator store".  Louis passed away in 1942.

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