James Lowry Smith

Duane's take

Here's my telling of what the official marker has to say about James Lowry Smith, up in Bell County. Now, if you wanted to find a man who could hold a school together through just about everything the nineteenth century could throw at him, you might look no further than Salado College, and you might find James Lowry Smith standing right at the center of it. Smith was no ordinary schoolman.

He'd earned his degrees at Baylor, then gone off and served in the Civil War before walking through the doors of Salado College as its professor and principal in 1863. Think about that timing for a moment. The war was still raging.

Enrollment was low. The kind of low that would make most educators pack their bags and find quieter work. But Smith stayed.

And the challenges didn't stop when the war did. The financial panic of 1873 came along and rattled institutions across the country, and Salado College was not spared. Yet despite that enrollment trouble, despite that financial storm, the college achieved high standards during Smith's tenure.

That's not boasting, that's the record. He served his first run at the college until 1874, then stepped away, then came back again from 1879 to 1880, that final year, to see the place through to the very end of its operation. There's something in that return that speaks to a man who felt the college was worth showing up for, right down to the last day.

At home, James Lowry Smith was married to Julia Catherine, born a McDowell, and together they raised seven children. And when he was gone, the words carved at his grave monument didn't reach for grand political titles or battlefield glory. They called him, and I'll quote it straight: an epitome of those blessed humanities of life, virtue, honor, and truth.

For a man who spent his life in a schoolroom on the Texas frontier, fighting off low enrollment and financial panic and the long shadow of war, well. That's about as fitting an epitaph as any marker in Texas has had to offer.

What the marker says

Salado college professor and principal James Lowry Smith was a progressive leader in education. He received degrees at Baylor and served in the Civil War before beginning his tenure at Salado College in 1863. Despite challenges, including low enrollment during the Civil War and the financial panic of 1873, Salado College achieved high standards during Smith’s tenure. He first served until 1874, and then again from 1879-80 in the college’s final year of operation. Married to Julia Catherine (McDowell) and father to seven children, James Lowry Smith, in words carved at his grave monument, is remembered as “an epitome of those blessed humanities of life, virtue, honor, and truth.”