BOWLING GREEN, Mo. — What’s a guy to do when one of the hottest actresses in Hollywood opens the front door and, instead of a greeting, proposes marriage?
Naturally, Jack Daugherty said “yes.”
And though the relationship with Barbara La Marr would sour and his life would end tragically, the Bowling Green native made his mark as an actor and stuntman in the early days of movies.
“See him fight, make love, ride like a frantic fury – with all the gallant fire that has made him the favorite of all Western fans,” proclaimed a Universal Pictures advertisement for the “The Fighting Ranger.”
Virgil Ashley Dougherty was born in Pike County on Nov. 16, 1895. He later changed the second letter in his last name to “a” and used the more regal-sounding first name “Jack.”
The family moved to California when Daugherty was young. He appeared in Broadway musicals before making his first film, the silent comedy “Big Brother Bill” in 1915. One more would follow before Daugherty joined the Marines to fight during World War I.
Upon returning from Europe, the actor picked up where he’d left off. The first of many westerns, “The Haunted Valley,” came in 1923, and debuted one day before La Marr not-so-slyly suggested taking their vows.
Daugherty had known the actress since she was a dancer in Chicago, but did not fall head-over-heels until they met again in Hollywood in 1921.
“I was insane about Barbara,” he is quoted in “Barbara La Marr: The Girl Who Was Too Beautiful for Hollywood” by Sherri Snyder.
It was easy to see the attraction. La Marr, who grew up in the Pacific Northwest, was smart, pretty, ambitious and energetic. Not only did she star in films, she also wrote them, and brought in big bucks for the studios.
On the down side, she drank heavily, had affairs and boasted of only getting two hours of sleep a night. She’d been married twice and perhaps thrice when Daugherty came to dinner, and may not have been legally divorced at the time. She’d also given birth 10 months earlier to a son, Marvin Carville La Marr. The pregnancy was kept secret for years and the father was never named.
Despite scandals and failed relationships, La Marr had a strong attraction to the six-foot-one-inch, freckle-faced, red-headed Missouri boy.
And why wouldn’t she? The good-looking actor had a rough-edged talent, and was courageous to the point that some might call crazy. In the days before computerized camera tricks, Daugherty once was captured jumping from an airplane onto a motorcycle. He would astonish colleagues during filming breaks by doing a hand stand from the saddle of his trotting horse.
It was a similar stunt that almost caused Daugherty to back out of the dinner invitation. While filming earlier that day, a horse fell on him. The actor managed to escape death, but still was in pain when he appeared on La Marr’s porch. The ache wouldn’t last long.
“You’re going to be married tonight,” La Marr smiled as she opened the door.
“Huh?” was all Daugherty could manage.
After regaining his composure, Daugherty agreed to tie the knot. Hurdles had to be cleared, however.
First, it was a Saturday night, so the couple had to drive 70 miles to Ventura County so that a patient clerk could issue a marriage license. Second, director and friend Paul Bern had to awaken a Hollywood jeweler to secure a ring. Third, a minister had to be found. The couple went to the home of the Rev. T.W. Patterson.
The nuptials took place just after 11 p.m. – witnessed by Bern, La Marr’s mother and brother, and a reporter from the Los Angeles Times.
“I had made up my mind to marry Jack someday, but at noon today I had no more idea of marrying him than, well, than of marrying you,” La Marr told the scribe. “Then, well, I just decided.”
The couple arrived at a Persian-themed hotel in Santa Barbara about 1 a.m. Sunday. It was a short honeymoon, because by the next day both were back at work.
La Marr told reporters that divorce “may be an evil, but it certainly makes one appreciate a good husband afterwards.” The actress said Daugherty was her ideal man and pledged that “it’s going to stick.”
Unfortunately, reality was no glue. Daugherty eventually grew to resent La Marr’s fame, and the pair separated a year later. Though there’s disagreement, they apparently were still legally married when she died of tuberculosis at age 29 on Jan. 30, 1926.
Daugherty married actress Virginia Brown Faire in 1927, but they were divorced two years later. He continued to make films with such stars as Bob Hope, Spencer Tracy, W.C. Fields, Gary Cooper, Janet Gaynor, Ralph Bellamy, Myrna Loy and Dorothy Lamour.
Though mostly portraying cowboys, cops and tough guys, Daugherty also appeared in comedies such as the Little Rascals’ Our Gang farce “General Spanky” in 1936.
Alcohol abuse, legal problems and unpaid debts took a mounting toll. “The glamour that had once touched him had tarnished,” according to radio and television host Jimmy Starr.
On May 16, 1938, Daugherty drove his car to Woodstock Road in the Hollywood Hills, rigged a hose from the exhaust pipe to the passenger compartment and died of carbon monoxide poisoning. He was 42.
The actor left four notes, at least two of which contained wording that the suicide was for the best. Marvin La Marr was adopted by actress ZaSu Pitts and her husband, Tom Gallery, and renamed Don Gallery. He died in 2014.
Daugherty’s passing received scant newspaper attention.
“Even in death, he failed to get into the big time,” wrote Starr, who revealed that Daugherty had wanted to tell him something the day before his death but never got a chance. “His exit was pinpointed briefly by a sputtering spotlight, which was burning out after having remained so long on a beautiful star.”
In the featured image, Barbara La Marr and Jack Daugherty return to work at Universal Studios in Hollywood just two days after their 1923 marriage.
