Bill Daniel

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This article is about Bill Daniel, the late Texas politician; for the experimental filmmaker with the same name, see Bill Daniel (Filmmaker) (disambiguation)

Bill Daniel (right) and his wife "Miss Vara" at one of their meetings with President Kennedy.

William (Bill) Partlow Daniel (20 November 1915 – 20 June 2006), was a Governor of Guam and Democratic member of the Texas House of Representatives. Born in Dayton, Texas, and a graduate of Baylor University, he spent the majority of his life working as a lawyer in Liberty County, Texas.

Bill Daniel was born into a wealthy and prominent Texas family, his older brother Price Daniel Sr. went on to become Governor of Texas, Texas Supreme Court Justice and a US Senator. Daniel made large donations to good causes especially to his alma mater Baylor University, several of the campus buildings are named after him, his late wife Vara and other members of the Daniel family.^[1][2]

[edit] Political career

From 1949 to 1953 he served as a Democratic Party member of the Texas House of Representatives for the 14th District, his brother Price had previously held this office from 1939 - 1945.

In 1961 President John F. Kennedy appointed him to the position of Governor of Guam, an office he held from May 20, 1961 to January 20, 1963.
His main achievement as Governor was to arrange for the removal of the requirement of a "security clearance" to enter or leave Guam, by persuading Kennedy to sign an Executive Order (No.11045), rescinding the one put in place during 1941 by President Franklin D. Roosevelt. The old (war-time) travel restrictions required that all civilians wishing to visit Guam needed to obtain approval from a senior US Navy officer based in Washington, D.C.; this often took weeks to obtain. This was obviously an obstacle to development, especially in the area of tourism, and its removal greatly benefited the economy of the territory.

His appointment resulted in the first occasion in which brothers simultaneously held governorships in the United States, as his older brother Price was governor of Texas for the entire time of his service as governor of Guam.

[edit] Trivia

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Bill Daniel appeared in the John Wayne film The Alamo playing Colonel Neill. Daniel also provided the film with 400 longhorns and hundreds of horses from his ranch.

[edit] References

1. ^ Baylor University campus buildings
2. ^ Bill Daniel's Baylor obituary

[edit] External links

• Legislative Reference Library of Texas.
• Bill Daniel at the Internet Movie Database