Harry Smith Harry Smith is a practical and experienced sign-writer, of No. 14 Canal street, Grand Rapids, was born in Phillipsburg, Warren county, N.J., March 7, 1855, and is the eldest of the four children that crowned the marriage of Samuel and Amelia (Arnold) Smith, both natives of Pennsylvania. Their remaining three children are Jarvis, a farmer at Roscoe, Ill.; Anna, wife of John Brown, a farmer of Chickasaw county, Iowa, and Edward a molder, in Grand Rapids, Mich. All are married and heads of families. Harry Smith was an infant when his parent removed from New Jersey to Rockford, Ill., and there, when ten years of age, he was bereft by death of his mother, since when he has been self-supporting. His father remarried and is now engage in fruit growing at Fruitport, Mich. Harry Smith attended the common schools of Rockford, Ill., until his mother’s death, and remained in the town until twenty years of age. In 1876 he came to Grand Rapids and began an apprenticeship of two years at his present calling. In 1878 he bought the business from his employer and is now the oldest sign-writer in the city. From his early boyhood he developed a taste for his art, and preferred it to any other employment, even then resolving that it should be his life work, and his budding talent at that early day has fructified in the production of one of the best artists in this line in the state of Michigan. Mr. Smith also became much interested in base-ball in his early manhood, and followed his fortunes on the "diamond" for nine years, playing in the cities of Danville, Rock Island, Rockford and Freeport, Ill.; Dubuque and Davenport, Iowa; Janesville, Beloit and Racine, Wis., and also with several amateur teams. Mr. Smith was married in Grand Rapids, December 25, 1878, to Miss Susie DeYoung, a native of this city and a daughter of Cornelius and Johanna DeYoung, old residents – the father having been engaged in teaming here for many years—and the parents of seven children, viz: John, Mary, James, Jennie, Susie, Hannah and Samuel, all married, with the exception perhaps of Samuel, who has not been heard from in fifteen years. John is in business in Cadillac, and James is mayor of Holland, Mich.; the others are all in Grand Rapids. To Mr. and Mrs. Harry Smith have been born four sons, viz: Judson, an artist in Detroit; Howard, who assists his father, and Perry and Roger A., attending school. Politically, Mr. Smith is democratic in his views, but is not violently partisan. Fraternally he is united with various orders. He joined the A. O. U. W. in 1889, has passed all the official stations in the local lodge of Michigan, and is a member of the Knights of Fidelity, a uniform rank of the A. O. U. W.; his is also a member of the M. W. A. He owns a pleasant home at No. 225 Clancy street, where he and family have lived the past fifteen years, and where their long residence has placed them among the most respected people of the whole neighborhood.