The Globe Gazette
Mason City, Cerro Gordo County, Iowa
by Dave Bryant, 1951

DOUGHERTY -- It was in July, 1901 that T. C. RYAN arrived in Doughtery -- an ambitious young pharamicst (sic) with $350 savings to invest in a drug store.

RYAN celebrated his 50th anniversary as a Dougherty business man Tuesday by staging an open house with free ice cream, soft drinks, and special prizes for his customers of the community.

As an incorportated town, Dougherty was just 8 months old when RYAN arrived.

There were times with the going was tough, RYAN admits. He was burned out twice.

Just two months after he opened his first Dougherty drug store, a fire claimed it along with every other building south of the east-west main street of the town. It left the young druggist $1,600 in the red. That was a lot of money in those days, RYAN recalls.

He rebuilt the location which his store now occupies. Again in 1940, a fire destroyed his place of business. A neat one-story stucco structure, the home of RYAN'S present business, was built soon afterward.

So for almost 50 years RYAN has been serving the needs of the Irish-settled Doughtery community from his little corner drug store. Pills for pains, candy for kiddies or chemicals for crops -- the people of Dougherty learned that RYAN could fill their needs.

Transcription by Sharon R. Becker, March of 2011