BIO: Frank SMITH, Clearfield County, PA Contributed for use in the USGenWeb Archives by Judy Banja & Sally Copyright 2005. All rights reserved. http://www.usgwarchives.net/copyright.htm http://www.usgwarchives.net/pa/clearfield/ NOTE: Use this web address to access other bios: http://www.usgwarchives.net/pa/clearfield/1picts/swoope/swoope.htm _____________________________________________________________ From Twentieth Century History of Clearfield County, Pennsylvania, and Representative Citizens, by Roland D. Swoope, Jr., Chicago: Richmond-Arnold Publishing Company, 1911, pages 572 & 573. _____________________________________________________________ FRANK SMITH, one of Lawrence township's busy, enterprising and successful men, is in the lumber and saw mill business, owning a portable mill and leasing large tracts of land for his purposes. He was born December 20, 1869, in Girard township, Clearfield county, Pa., and is a son of Isaac and Fanny Smith. The father of Mr. Smith was a man of considerable prominence in Clearfield county, serving many years as a justice of the peace and as secretary of the township school board, and at the time of his death, in January, 1905, owned 800 acres of land, the timber on which is worth $8,000, many hundred acres also being rich in coal deposits. His widow survives and resides on the home farm in Girard township. Frank Smith obtained a public school education in Girard township and then went into the lumbering business, in fact has been interested in this industry from boyhood, having begun by cutting, hauling, and rafting timber to be taken to market via the Susquehanna river. He followed this business, going down the river each year for eighteen successive years, spending the summers in the bark woods, always working by contract where possible. In 1893 Mr. Smith purchased 300 acres of timber land lying along the West Branch of the Susquehanna river and spent several years in profitably clearing same and in 1908 sold the land to Isaac Stage of Clearfield, Pa. In 1897 he bought one hundred acres of land in West Keating township, Clinton county. When this was cleared he sold, in 1910, to James McGonigal. He has some 750 acres of timber land under lease at the present time, keeps three of his own teams at work and gives constant employment to from five to twelve men. For two years after his marriage he resided at Clearfield, where he built a residence and a store and engaged in business as a merchant. He then sold the store to E. L. Shirey and resumed his lumbering interests, first in Bradford township, then in Graham township and later in Lawrence township. Before coming to this section he had already cut more than 2,500 acres of land. Mr. Smith is a practical lumber man and his advice is worth taking concerning everything pertaining to this industry. In 1909 Mr. Smith purchased 124 acres of coal land in Boggs township, which promises to be profitable when developed. Mr. Smith married Miss Ora Holt, a daughter of Reuben and Margaret (Forcey) Holt, and they have one son, Leslie Clair. In politics he is a Republican. He is a member of the Clearfield lodge of Odd Fellows.