James Lowry Smith

A Salado Historical Society biography says James Lowry Smith was born in Raleigh, North Carolina, in 1827, the eldest of seven children, and studied under Rufus Burleson at Old Independence. He is best remembered for the Euphradian Society, which taught older male students parliamentary procedure, debate and public speaking. The Handbook of Texas adds that Salado College ran twenty-four years on tuition alone, with enrollment averaging 250 from 1866 to 1872. Smith died on January 10, 1883, and lies in the Old Salado Graveyard.

What the plaque says

James Lowry Smith 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." (2010)

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Temple Railroad and Heritage Museum — 16 mi
  The Santa Fe depot of 1911 in a railroad town that began in 1880 as a construction camp, now a museum with locomotives and cars parked beside the active rail yard.
• Williamson County Courthouse — 22 mi
  The fifth Williamson County courthouse, a Beaux Arts building by C. H. Page, rises over a Georgetown square of more than 50 Victorian-era buildings.
• Inner Space Cavern — 25 mi
  A Georgetown cave found in 1963 when highway engineers drilled test holes, holding Pleistocene fossils and 72-degree rooms that visitors reach by an artificial tunnel.

More markers nearby

• Dr. Welborn and Louisa Adeline Barton — steps away
• Hermon and Margaret L. Aiken — steps away
• Capt. Milton Wesley Damron — steps away
• Major Archibald Johnson Rose — 0.3 mi