Denver-Pueblo-Las Animas County CO Archives Biographies.....Daniel, George W. 1859 - 
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Joy Fisher http://www.genrecords.net/emailregistry/vols/00001.html#0000031 January 1, 2009, 5:17 pm

Author: Wilbur Fiske Stone (1918)

GEORGE W. DANIEL.

    George W. Daniel is postoffice inspector in charge of the Denver division,
which embraces the four states of Colorado. New Mexico, Utah and Wyoming and
includes twenty-five hundred offices. Steadily he has worked his way upward to
this position of importance and responsibility and his course has been
characterized at all times by the utmost fidelity to duty as well as by
capability in discharge of the tasks which fall to his lot. Mr. Daniel is a
native son of Arkansas, his birth having occurred in Searcy county on the 30th
of October, 1859. His father, William P. Daniel, was a native of Georgia and was
descended from an old family of Lynchburg, Virginia, of English origin. The
family was started on American soil by William and John Daniel, who came from
Cornwall, England, about 1640 and settled where Lynchburg, Virginia, was later
founded. Ancestors of Mr. Daniel were among the prominent factors in state and
national affairs, including men of letters and of learning and of marked
political influence. Among the family was John Moncure Daniel, who served with
the rank of major in the Revolutionary war. The Daniel family was directly
related to the Ball family of Virginia, which numbered among its members Mary
Ball, who married into the Washington family and became the mother of George
Washington.

    William P. Daniel, father of George W. Daniel, on leaving his native state
of Georgia removed to Arkansas, where he became a successful farmer. He took up
his abode in the latter state about 1846, following the removal of the Cherokee
Indians from that district, and he was one of the first white settlers who
established a home on the south side of the Ozark mountain range. He served with
the federal troops in the Civil war, becoming a member of the Third Arkansas
Cavalry. He is a man of lofty patriotism and undaunted loyalty. He was wounded
while at the front, and his army service undermined his health, but though
entitled to a pension he would under no circumstances accept government aid in
recognition of what he had done for his country. In politics he has been a
stalwart democrat since the reconstruction period. He exemplifies in his life
the beneficent spirit of the Masonic fraternity, to which he belongs, and he
holds membership in the Methodist church, being a devout Christian. His entire
career has been actuated by high ideals and his word is as good as any bond
solemnized by signature or seal. He is now living retired, enjoying the fruits
of a well spent life and an untarnished name, his career ever commanding for him
the goodwill and confidence of those with whom he has been brought in contact.
He married Lavinia E. Hatchett, a native of Tennessee and a representative of
one of the old southern families of both Kentucky and Tennessee. Her father was
Page Hatchett, a pioneer of Obion county, Tennessee, and of English lineage. He
was a companion of and hunter with Davy Crockett, with whom he took part in
hunting expeditions to the Reelfoot Lake region of Obion county, Tennessee. The
great-grandfather of George W. Daniel in the maternal line was the progenitor of
the American branch of the Hatchett family and the grandfather became a well
known hunter and successful planter of Tennessee and of Arkansas and removed to
the latter state at the same time the Daniel family took the trip. In fact, the
two families were of the same wagon train. The parents of Mr. Daniel of this
review were at that time young people and were married in Arkansas and to them
were born eleven children, seven sons and four daughters. Both parents still
survive and are among the honored residents of their adopted state.

    George W. Daniel, who was the second of the family, acquired his education
in the public schools of his native county and in Marshall Academy at Marshall,
Arkansas, while later he attended the Bellefonte Collegiate Institute at
Bellefonte, Arkansas, and eventually continued his studies in the Arkansas
Conference Seminary at Harrison, where he completed his course in 1879. His
youthful days were spent upon the home farm until he reached the age of
seventeen years, and during that period he underwent the hardships and
privations of pioneer life and did all kinds of hard work incident to the
settlement of a new country, including the building of log cabins, splitting
rails, etc. He was ambitious to acquire a good education, however, and embraced
every opportunity to further that end. After his graduation he entered upon
educational work and for Ave years successfully engaged in teaching school in
Arkansas and Texas, imparting clearly and readily to others the knowledge that
he had acquired. During this time he also took up newspaper work and established
and published the first newspaper of Searcy county, Arkansas, called the Searcy
County New Era. It was published weekly and was of democratic policy. Mr. Daniel
was identified with newspaper interests from the fall of 1886 until 1890. In
June, 1887, he established a paper called the Boston Banner, which was published
at Boston, Las Animas county, Colorado, and remained in the newspaper business
altogether for five years. The venture, however, did not prove successful and in
the early part of 1889 he came to Denver with financial resources completely
exhausted. His first employment here was in driving a bobtail horse car but
after a brief period he reentered journalistic circles as a reporter, concluding
his reportorial work in June, 1890, with the Star, published at Pueblo. In July
of that year he entered the postal service at Denver as a letter carrier, alter
passing the civil service examination, and continued to act in that capacity
until 1898. In the fall of that year he was transferred to New York in what is
known as the ocean mail, or seaport service, continuing therein until Marclu
1906. During that period he crossed the ocean one hundred and eighty times and
toured the continent of Europe, particularly England, France and Germany. In
international postal matters he became quite expert in everything having to do
with the foreign and domestic postal laws and service. In March, 1906, he was
appointed by the postmaster general, George B. Cortelyou, after civil service
examination, to the position of postoffice inspector. In August, 1915, he was
made inspector in charge of the Denver division, with twenty-five hundred
postoffices in Colorado, New Mexico, Utah and Wyoming under his direction.

    In Searcy county, Arkansas, in November, 1882, Mr. Daniel was married to
Miss Cynthia Frances Turney, who was born in Searcy county and belongs to one of
the old Tennessee families. Her father, Dr. George Turney, removed at an early
day to Arkansas. To Mr. and Mrs. Daniel have been born two daughters, Ethel and
Uncas. The former is an artist of New York city, while the latter is an actress
on the legitimate stage.

    Mr. Daniel is a democrat and stanchly supports the principles of the party.
He belongs to Temple Lodge, No. 84, A. F. & A. M., and is a worthy exemplar of
the teachings of the craft. He was elected and served as master of his lodge in
the year 1898. Through the steps of an orderly progression he has reached his
present high and enviable position in the federal service and there is perhaps
no one in the west more thoroughly informed concerning the postoffice department
in all of its ramifying interests and connections. He has faithfully served his
country in this way for about twenty-eight years and his record remains an
untarnished one.


Additional Comments:

Extracted from:

HISTORY OF COLORADO

ILLUSTRATED
VOLUME II
CHICAGO
THE S. J. CLARKE PUBLISHING COMPANY
1918


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