Charles W. Lyon | |
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49th Speaker of the California State Assembly |
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In office January 1943 – January 1946 |
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Preceded by | Gordon Hickman Garland |
Succeeded by | Sam L. Collins |
Constituency | Los Angeles, California |
Personal details | |
Born | September 13, 1887 Los Angeles, California, U.S. |
Died | July 20, 1960 Beverly Hills, California, U.S. |
(aged 72)
Political party | Republican |
Spouse(s) | Nancy Janney |
Profession | attorney |
Charles W. Lyon (September 13, 1887 – July 20, 1960) was an American attorney from California who served as a Republican in the California State Assembly and the California State Senate. Lyon was Assembly Speaker from 1943 to 1946. Lyon was admitted to the Bar in 1910 and was first elected to the Assembly in 1914. Lyon served numerous terms in the Senate and Assembly and authored the legislation creating the UCLA campus.
Lyon was born in Los Angeles on September 13, 1887. He was the eighth of nine children of James H. and Laura Emma (Simpson) Lyon, who had moved to California from Maine. The family was distantly related to John Alden and to Henry Wadsworth Longfellow. James Lyon was a carpenter foreman and architect. Charles attended the public schools in Los Angeles and San Francisco, then studied law at night while working for the Title Insurance and Trust Company in Los Angeles; he had begun working for the company at the age of fifteen. He was admitted to the California Bar at the age of 23 in 1910. He then went into private practice as a member of the firm of Fredericks & Hanna. He married Nancy Janney, daughter of a well known Utah mining engineer on September 21, 1912, and the couple would have three children.
At age 21, Lyon was elected president of Los Angeles Parlor No. 45 of the Native Sons of the Golden West. Lyon became state president of the California State Aerie of Eagles, which then had over thirty thousand members in California. In 1919, he was elected exalted ruler for 1919–20 of Santa Monica Elks Lodge.
In 1914, Lyon became City Attorney of Venice, California, where he and his family were living as of 1921. Later that year, Lyon was elected to the California State Assembly as a Republican, and was reelected in 1916. While in the Assembly, he opposed the Populist reforms being enacted at that time. In 1918, he ran for the State Senate, and was elected. He remained in the Senate until defeated for re-election in 1930.
After two years out of office, Lyon ran for and was elected to the Assembly again, and would serve there until 1946. In the Assembly, he feared that Governor Frank Merriam would move to the left in response to the Depression, and actively opposed Merriam's Democratic successor, Culbert Olson.