Senator Daniel Clifford Nolan View All Years

D. C. NOLAN

MR. PRESIDENT: Your committee, appointed to prepare a suitable resolution commemorating the life, character and public service of the late honorable D. C. Nolan, begs leave to submit the following memorial:

D. C. “Cliff” Nolan was born on a farm in Guthrie County, Iowa, August 29, 1902, the son of Martin J. and Anna Hanley Nolan. He attended country school in Guthrie County and was graduated from high school in Perry, Iowa, and from Creighton University. He was married to Margaret Schwertley of Missouri Valley in 1927. They had three sons and five daughters.

Mr. Nolan received his law training at Creighton University and in the office of Judge Tom Guthrie in Des Moines. Upon being admitted to practice he was associated with the firm of Parrish, Cohen, Guthrie, Halloran and Waters from 1926 until 1931, when he moved to Iowa City and continued practicing law until his death.

In 1952, Mr. Nolan was elected to the Iowa Senate from the old Twenty-fifth Senatorial District, Iowa and Johnson Counties, and served during the Fifty-fifth, Fifty-sixth, Fifty-seventh, Fifty-eighth, Fifty-ninth, Sixtieth and Sixtieth Extraordinary General Assemblies. During his twelve years in the Senate, he served as chairman of many important committees, including the Highways and Judiciary 1 committees. He was the majority floor leader during the Fifty-seventh General Assembly.

While a member of the Senate, Mr. Nolan sponsored legislation which created the legislative research bureau, established enforcement of standards in distribution of pharmaceutical products, established maximum and minimum speed limits on highways, established controlled access facilities, authorized “urban renewal” and the development of recreational areas as well as the transfer of lands for the Coralville and Red Rock Reservoir projects. He authored the uniform gift to minors law and many other important bills.

Mr. Nolan cosponsored a resolution that led to the “asphalt” inquiry into the operations of the Iowa Highway Commission in 1964, was also in the thick of legislative reapportionment battles of the 1960s and headed a Senate committee investigating the old Iowa Liquor Control Commission’s “sample room” policies.

Mr. Nolan was the first chairman of the Young Republican League of Iowa. He was a member of the local, state and national bar associations, having served as a member of the board of governors of the Iowa Bar Association, and as a past president of the Johnson County Bar Association. He taught courses in property and equity at the Des Moines College of Law and served as its president.

He was a charter member of the Junior Chamber of Commerce in Des Moines and a past president of the Iowa City Chamber of Commerce.

Mr. Nolan was a former area president and national counselor for the Boy Scouts of America; a fifty-year honorary member of the fourth degree, Knights of Columbus; a member of the Elks Club, the Loyal Order of the Moose, the Izaak Walton League, the Des Moines Club and St. Patrick’s Church.

Mr. Nolan suffered a stroke while visiting a daughter in Des Moines and died on April 15, 1973. He is survived by his wife, Margaret; five daughters, Elizabeth Ann, an assistant Attorney General of Iowa; Mrs. Frank Wagner of Iowa City; Mrs. Benjamin Calacci of Wheaton, Illinois; Frances of San Francisco, California, and Mary Margaret of Iowa City; three sons, Daniel of El Paso, Texas, John of Iowa City, and Richard of Washington, D. C.; one sister, Miss Hilda Nolan of Des Moines, and fifteen grandchildren.

Therefore, Be It Resolved by the Senate of the Sixty-fifth General Assembly of the State of Iowa: That, in the passing of the Honorable D. C. Nolan, the state has lost an honored citizen and a faithful and useful public servant, and the Senate by this resolution would express its appreciation of his services to his community, state and nation and tender its sympathy and kindest regards to the members of his family.

Be It Further Resolved: That a copy of this resolution be spread upon the Journal of the Senate, and that the Secretary of the Senate he directed to forward an enrolled copy to the family of the deceased.

TOM RILEY, Chairman

ELIZABETH O. SHAW

MINNETTE DODERER

Committee

The resolution was unanimously adopted.