William H. Smiley Papers, 1899-1919

William Hudson Smiley, age eleven, and his brother, Charles, age 15, arrived in Spokane Falls, Washington Territory, October 8, 1878. They were traveling with their sister and brother-in-law, Clara and William Chandler Gray. It had taken them six days to cover the distance from Walla Walla with two wagons, one of which carried building materials for the hotel Gray was going to build at The Falls.

Both boys were born in Marysville, California. Their father, Johnson Foster Smiley, had been lured from the family home in Benton, Maine to the gold fields in the far west. Eight years later Mrs. Smiley, Sarah Ann Richardson, and her two children, Fred and Clara, joined him.

After their mother died in 1873, Clara and Bill Gray took the two younger boys into their home. Gray made an investigating trip to Spokane Falls in the summer of 1878, then wired Clara to join him. She and the boys left San Fracnsisco on the steamer Great Republic bound for Portland, Oregon. From there they journeyed by river steamer and portage railroads to Wallula. Aboard Dr. Baker's "strap-iron" railroad they arrived in Walla Walla the last day of September.

In January 1879 Gray's hotel, California House, was completed enough for the family to move in. Will attended the first Episcopal School on the south-west corner of Riverside and Lincoln. With friends, Jerome Drumheller and Lucius Nash, Will was involved in a number of childhood pranks, like putting red pepper on the stove in school.

Smiley also attended the Spokane College on College Avenue. For several years he worked as a bookkeeper for Traders National Bank before matriculating at the University of Michigan Law School. Following graduation in 1895, he returned to Spokane in 1897 and opened a law office in the Sherwood Building.

Will boarded with Adalena Meeks Cooper, the widow of Dr. John T. Cooper, her daughter, Daisy, and sister, Melissa Meeks, at 1919 West Pacific Avenue. In 1903 William H. Smiley and Melissa Meeks were married, and continued to make their home with Mrs. Cooper.

In addition to his law practice, Smiley remained a classical scholar of Greek and Latin. In 1908 he translated the first four books of Virgil's Aeneid into blank verse. Nine years later he translated the first two books into heroic couplet. Smiley was also noted for writing poetry about prominent citizens in Spokane, and sonnets to Curly Jim, and Princess Nellie, daughter of Spokane Garry. About D. C. Corbin he wrote:

• "My tired feet have followed far
• A weary road, whose end I see,
• And just beyond where shadows fall,
• Lies life's unfathomed mystery."

In 1912 Bancroft-Whitney of San Francisco published his text on Bills of Exceptions and Statements of Facts based on the Statutes of the State of Washington and the decisions of the Supreme Court of Washington.

For ten years, 1924-1934, Smiley was the chief attorney for the Federal Land Bank in Hoquiam. Upon returning to Spokane, they made their home with the W. C. Grays at West 414 Sixth Avenue.

Will Smiley passed away January 24, 1944 at the age of 76. Melissa Meeks Smiley died December 5, 1946. They were childless.