Lillian Myrtle Dabney Daugherty, 1928-2022
IMB Photo

Lillian Myrtle Dabney Daugherty, an International Mission Board missionary emeritus who shared the gospel in Japan, died Feb. 19, 2022. She was 93.

Daugherty was born on Sept. 15, 1928, to the late W.C. (Bill) and Lola Bertram Dabney in Wayne County, Kentucky, and grew up in Monticello. After high school, she moved to Nashville to attend the University of Tennessee Business College. While there, she became friends with Annie Daugherty. Annie invited Myrtle to meet her brother Robert Julian Daugherty, and the two quickly fell in love. Bob and Myrtle were married on September 4, 1948.

Myrtle wrote when seeking to serve as a missionary that both her parents had a strong faith and were deeply involved in their church. Her mother “had a dear friend, Miss Flora Dodson, who was a missionary to China. It was through Miss Flora’s life and testimony that I first became interested in world missions. Her love and concern for the Chinese people still impress me.”

Bob and Myrtle were settling into marriage and family life when God called Bob to preach, wrote Myrtle. Bob finished college at Belmont University, Nashville, while pastoring Ramah Baptist Church in Watertown, Tennessee. They moved to California to attend Golden Gate Baptist Theological Seminary, where Bob pastored Burlingame Baptist Church. Myrtle worked at State Farm Insurance while Bob attended seminary. After he graduated, the couple moved to Chickasaw, Oklahoma, where he was pastor of College Heights Baptist Church. In 1961, Bob and Myrtle accepted the call to start a mission of Woodmont Baptist, Forest Hills Baptist Church in Nashville, Tennessee. They served at Forest Hills for 14 years.

Then the Lord stirred Bob and Myrtle to go the foreign mission field. The Foreign Mission Board (now International Mission Board) named them missionaries to Japan, and they served for 14 years in Misawa, Kyoto, and Tsukuba, Japan.

After retirement in 1989, they moved to Franklin, Tennessee, and then bought a farm in Spring Hill and became cattle ranchers. After Bob became ill, they moved to Mt. Juliet to be with their daughter, Peggy, and her family. After 62 years of marriage, Bob died in 2010.

Myrtle was also preceded in death by her granddaughter Angela Jane Kough and her great granddaughter Abby Czirr.

She is survived by her children Bob Daugherty (Cynthia) of Thompson Station, Tennessee; Peggy Fannin (Robert Patrick) of Watertown, Tennessee; Janie Holste (Scott) of Fayetteville, Georgia; and Bob Gierhart (Gail), her “adopted” son, of Hawaii. Myrtle also is survived by 10 grandchildren and 17 great-grandchildren.

A celebration of life was held Feb. 28, 2022, at Spring Hill Funeral Home, Nashville, with burial at Historic Spring Hill Cemetery.

Donations in her memory may be made to the Lottie Moon Offering, IMB, 3806 Monument Avenue, Richmond, VA 23230, or online at Generosity Resource Center – IMB Generosity.

Read an obituary here.