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Memorial Keepers (1)
Beers and Story - Belchertown
Curtis Griffin Smith
November 14th, 1923 - February 15th, 2017
"Curtis Griffin Smith died February 15, 2017, at home in South Hadley, Massachusetts. He was 93 years old. Smith was Professor Emeritus at Mount Holyoke College, a founding member of All Saints Episcopal Church, a member of the South Hadley Town Meeting, the Prudential Committee of South Hadley Fire District 2, and the Board of the Evergreen Cemetery. Smith sang in the choir at All Saints for sixty years and sang with the Springfield Symphony Chorus for decades. Smith was born November 14, 1923, in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, to Joseph Griffin Smith and Clara Belle Shanbarker. Along with his sister, Jewel Elaine Smith, he grew up in Milwaukee where every week he roller skated to the library to check out the maximum of five books. He spent summers in Beloit, Wisconsin, with his grandparents, aunt, and cousins. After a year of study at the Milwaukee School of Engineering in 1941, Smith enrolled in the Signal Corps program for college students and then enlisted in the Army, serving in the Philippines with the Signal Corps. After the war he attended the University of Chicago, obtaining his Bachelor's degree in 1947. He was married on June 21, 1947, to Elaine Thompson of Pullman, Washington. Smith completed doctoral coursework in both physics and biology, obtaining his Ph.D. in Biology from the University of Chicago in 1954. Smith joined the faculty of Mount Holyoke College in 1955, where he taught in the Biology Department, the first man to do so since the college's founding. He was the author of Ancestral Voices: Language and the Evolution of Human Consciousness and a variety of papers, including two delivered to the Episcopal Guild of Scholars. A confirmed Anglophile, he studied and taught in England in 1962, 1969, and 1976. Smith's energy, curiosity, generosity, and optimism were hallmarks of his professional and personal life. He was fascinated throughout his life with neuroscience but, when asked to identify a plant or animal, always said "I'm not that kind of biologist." Otherwise his knowledge was vast and wide-ranging; he was tickled and proud when a student told him he was "a bottomless pit of information." After his retirement in 1992, Smith continued to teach and serve the College and the community. Elaine Thompson Smith predeceased him on August 18, 1999. Smith was married July 9, 2007, in Tacoma, Washington, to Dana Feldshuh Whyte, a physician and an alumna of Mount Holyoke College, who had been one of Smith's honor students in the Class of 1960. In addition to Dana Feldshuh Whyte, Smith is survived by his sister Jewel John of Athens, Georgia, and by his children, Eliot Smith and his wife Pamela Grenfell Smith of Bloomington, Indiana; Katherine Collett and her husband Brian Collett of Clinton, New York; and Alison Smith Meason and her fiancé Mike Powell of Roscoe, Illinois; and by his stepson David Cook and his wife Patti Cook of Tacoma, Washington. He is also survived by his grandchildren Miranda (and Philip) Hassett, Timothy (and Marsha) Collett, Thomas (and Jessica) Smith, Charles (and Jessica) Collett, Nicola Collett, Diane Meason, Joshua Meason, Madeline Meason, and step-grandchildren Noah and Orion Cook; and by his great-grandchildren Griffin Hassett and Iona Hassett. The funeral service will be held Sunday, March 19, 2017, 2:30 p.m. at All Saints Episcopal Church, South Hadley, followed by a reception at the Willits-Hallowell Conference Center on the Mount Holyoke College campus. In lieu of flowers, consider donating to: The Curtis G. Smith Student Research Fund Attention: Diane Freedland Office of Advancement Mount Holyoke College 50 College Street South Hadley, MA 01075 "
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Beers and Story - Belchertown
Beers and Story has proudly served our Western Mass community since the early 1900s, when Bert Beers first opened our doors. Three generations later, we are still committed to helping families in Belchertown plan funeral and cremation services to help honor their loved ones. We provide compassionate and professional care to every family that walks through our doors. You can count on us to take care of you....
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