BIO: Allison Opp SMITH, Clearfield County, PA
 
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From Twentieth Century History of Clearfield County, Pennsylvania,
and Representative Citizens, by Roland D. Swoope, Jr.,
Chicago: Richmond-Arnold Publishing Company, 1911, pages 353-355.
_____________________________________________________________ 

  ALLISON OPP SMITH, president judge of the Forty-sixth Judicial District of 
Pennsylvania, comprising Clearfield county, was born in Limestone township, 
Montour county, Pennsylvania, on October 23, 1857; second child of Simpson 
and Charlotte Opp Smith, both natives of Lycoming county, of pioneer stock 
and of families identified with the early and successful lumbering and 
agricultural development of the Susquehanna Valley.  His grandfather Jonathan 
Smith was a native of Philadelphia county, and his great-grandfather Col. 
George Smith was a soldier in the Revolutionary war and represented 
Philadelphia county in the General Assembly of the State.  His grandmother 
Ann Simpson, of Bucks county, Pennsylvania, a great aunt of General U. S. 
Grant, married Jonathan Smith in 1796 and they went direct to Lycoming 
county, where they lived the rest of their lives.  The parents of Judge Smith 
moved to Northumberland county in 1867 and settled on a farm near Watsontown, 
where they lived until 1879, when they moved into Watsontown.
  The subject of our sketch attended the common district schools of the 
neighborhood and also attended academies at Dewart, McEwensville and 
Watsontown, also assisting on the farm until about sixteen years of age.  He 
then spent one year clerking in a country store at Dewart, and afterwards 
went to Bloomsburg State Normal School and prepared for entrance to State 
College, Center county, which he entered in January, 1876, and graduated with 
the honors of his class in 1879.  During the winter of 1879-80 he was elected 
principal of schools and taught the High School at Watsontown, after which he 
began reading law in the office of Oscar Foust, Esq., of that place.  In 
September, 1880, he entered the Law Department of the University of 
Pennsylvania, at Philadelphia, as a student at law, from which institution he 
graduated two years later in the Law Class of 1882.  During said period he 
was also registered as a law student in the office Of William A. Redding, J. 
Levering Jones and Hampton L. Carson, Esquires, of Philadelphia, and after 
his graduation, in June, 1882, on motion of J. Levering Jones, Esq., one of 
his preceptors, he was admitted to practice law in the several courts of 
Philadelphia, and later in the same month was admitted to practice law in the 
Northumberland County Court.
  In September, 1882, he located in Clearfield and was admitted to practice 
the law in the several courts of Clearfield county on the 8th day of January,  
1883.  For several years he successfully practiced his profession alone,
during which time he served as solicitor for Sheriff R. N. Shaw and Sheriff 
E. L. McCloskey, and later as county solicitor.  In 1894, after the elevation 
of Hon. Cyrus Gordon to the Common Pleas Bench, he formed a partnership with 
Thomas H. Murray, Esq., under the style of Murray & Smith, and this 
partnership continued until the junior member was elected to succeed Judge 
Gordon on the Common Pleas Bench, which honor was won at the November 
election in 1903 by a majority of 2,016.
  In politics Judge Smith has been a Democrat all his life and took an active 
and earnest interest in party affairs from the time of arriving at man's 
estate.  He served as secretary of the Democratic County Committee for 
several years beginning in 1886, and in 1890 was elected county chairman and 
had the distinction of polling the largest majorities for his party 
candidates that year ever given in the county.  In 1896 he was appointed and 
served as councilman from the First Ward of Clearfield borough, and in 1897 
was elected to the office of burgess of Clearfield and served three years in 
that position.  In 1900 he was elected school director and was filling that 
position when elected to the bench.
  As a lawyer Judge Smith soon won his way to the front at the Clearfield 
bar.  He was recognized as possessing a clear, keen, logical mind, which 
combined with his industry and high character won him the respect and 
confidence of his clients.  While a member of the firm of Murray & Smith he 
had a wide experience in the practice of corporation law, as that firm 
represented nearly all the railroads of the county and they also represented 
a large number of the leading mining corporations.  Since going on the bench 
Judge Smith has gained much prominence in judicial circles all over the 
State.  At his first license court he created a precedent in the conduct and 
control of the court over the granting of liquor licenses, first, by largely 
reducing the number of licenses and refusing nearly fifty per cent of the 
applicants and, second, by establishing what is believed to be wholesome 
rules for governing the sales of liquor and the maintenance of licensed 
hotels.  Similar rules have since been adopted by a considerable number of 
the judges of the State and the wisdom of their establishment is apparent to 
anyone who has occasion to patronize the hotels of Clearfield county.  Since 
he went upon the bench the criminal business has largely decreased, 
notwithstanding a large increase of population, composed of the people of 
southern Europe who know little of the laws and customs of this country.  
This decrease in the criminal business is popularly believed to be largely 
due to the strict enforcement of the law in both the license and criminal 
courts as administered by Judge Smith.  The general business of the courts 
under Judge Smith has been conducted with great promptness and dispatch and 
no one can complain of any delay in the administration of justice.  Four 
times a year all cases at issue, whether in the civil or criminal courts, 
whether in equity or on the argument list, by order of the court are listed 
for trial and hearing and a prompt disposal of the same enforced so far as 
can be done by an early trial and decision.
  Judge Smith is a member of the Presbyterian church and has for many years 
been on the board of trustees.  He also belongs to the Masonic fraternity of 
Clearfield and has gone through all the chairs of the Blue Lodge and is a 
member of the Chapter.  Although always busy with his professional duties, he 
has at all times been closely identified with movements intended to advance the 
interests of the community, commercially and morally.  In 1889 he was an 
organizer and the first secretary and treasurer, as well as director, of the 
Electric Light Company at Clearfield, with which he was connected until soon 
after he went upon the bench.  He was also an organizer, director and president 
of the Paterson Clay Products Company, manufacturers of all kinds of paving and 
building brick.  He was one of the organizers of the Clearfield Y. M. C. A. and 
on its board of directors ever since its organization and is now president of 
that body, to the maintenance of which worthy institution he gives largely of 
his time and means.  In 1904 he was chairman of the Clearfield County Centennial 
Association Committee, which conducted to a successful conclusion the 
celebration of the one hundredth anniversary of the formation of Clearfield 
county.  He has been a member of the Pennsylvania Bar Association since its 
organization in 1894, and is now one of the vice-presidents of that body.  He is 
also a non-resident member of the Pennsylvania Society of New York.
  Judge Smith was married in Clearfield, on October 17, 1888, to Margaret 
Helen, youngest daughter of the late Senator William A. Wallace.  They have 
one son, William Wallace, and three daughters, Charlotte, Margaret and 
Rebecca.