Charles McKevett Teague, Class of 1927

February 15, 2002
Santa Paula High School
By B. J. Harding, President, SPUHS Alumni Association Biography #165 (Have you submitted yours?)Charles Collins and Harriett McKevett (Class of 1894) Teague had three children: Alice, who graduated from SPUHS in 1917; Milton, who graduated in 1921; and our subject, Charles, who graduated in 1927.At SPUHS Charles was a member of the basketball, football and baseball teams. He acted in the junior and senior plays, was in the operetta, and a member of the Scholarship Federation and the debating team. He served as president of the English Honor Society, president of his freshman class, and president of the Student Body his senior year. He was what one calls a “high achiever.”Following graduation from SPUHS Charles graduated from Stanford University in the Class of 1931, and from Stanford Law School in 1934. He was admitted to the bar in 1934, and commenced to practice law in Los Angeles and Ventura Counties.In 1942 Charles interrupted his law practice and joined the United States Air Force, serving as a major through 1946. At the end of the war, he resumed his law practice and became involved in community affairs. He was a director of the McKevett Corporation and the Teague-McKevett company. He served as president of the Ventura County Community Chest, the Ventura Rotary Club, and the Ojai Valley School Board of Trustees. He was president of the Ventura County Republican Assembly when he decided to run for Congress in 1954. He was reelected to Congress nine consecutive terms.
In Congress Charles was a dedicated, hard-working legislator whose prime interest was in what was best for Ventura County. He served as the ranking Republican member of the House Agriculture Committee, and was a leading advocate of American agriculture in Congress. Charles was the ranking member of the Agriculture Committee’s Conservation and Credit subcommittees. He was one of those responsible for bringing about an Interior Department ban on new oil drilling platforms in the Santa Barbara Channel. Another of his interests in Congress was fighting for the rights of veterans. It is known that he helped several Ventura County veterans with some of their medical and housing problems.Charles married Marjorie Cowden, also of the SPUHS Class of 1927, and together they had a son, Alan, and two daughters, Norma and Judith. Marjorie predeceased Charles, who passed away of a heart attack on January 1, 1974 in Santa Paula.



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