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Show A6 hC Information Bulletin, Vol. 29, No. 12, March 26, 1970 and Near Eastern History died Saturday, March 21, at the Washington Hospital Center after a brief illness. A recognized expert on Islamic and Iranian architecture and history, Dr. Smith held a B. F. A. degree from Yale University (1926), an M. A. in fine arts history from Harvard University (19^), and a Ph. D. in Islamic Archaeology from John Hopkins University (19^7)• While a student at Yale he did independent research in the Early Republican architecture of New England and out. of this interest came his first publications.. The summer of his junior year was spent in Europe which resulted in a series of original articles on the Romanesque brick architecture of Lombardy. On the basis of these studies he was awarded Guggenheim Fellowships in Italy for two years (1927-28) of independent research. A research fellowship from the American Council of Learned Societies enabled him to spend four years (1933-37) in Persia directing his own expedition for the study of .Islamic, architecture and established his life-long devotion to the Near East. His 30-year association with the Library of Congress as Honorary Consultant began in 1938 after his return from the Near East. He had a prominent role in the establishment of the Near Eastern Section of the Library and in the development of its•collections. Dr. Smith sought to promote Near Eastern programs in American universities for the benefit of Americans as well as students from Islamic countries. At various times in his career, he was a staff member of the Oriental Institute of the University of Chicago and was associated with Columbia University, Pratt Institute, Pennsylvania State University, and the University of Utah. He also traveled and lectured in many countries. Under'the auspices of the State Department he made two extended journeys to lecture on Islamic architecture at 22 universities' in 10 countries. He had planned to present a paper at a conference of scholars at the University of Meshed (Iran) on March 19-20 in celebration of the 1,000th anniversary of the birth of the Islamic ..theologian Sheikh Toosi, but was unable to attend because, of illness. His articles and photographs dealing with Near Eastern culture have appeared in more than 50'publications, the most well known a series of monographs entitled Materials for a. Corpus for Early Islamic Architecture. During the past 30 years he had developed an Islamic archive of photographic documents numbering over 87,000 items which are privately held but accessible to scholars. At the time of his death he was working on a book entitled Iranian Arches and Vaulted Architecture. In 1961+ Dr. Smith was awarded the Order of Homayoun, Collier, Iran's highest decoration for scholarly achievement. He is survived by his wife, Katharine, of the home, 1789 Lanier PI., N. W., Washington, D. C., and a brother, Ellis S., of Escondido, Calif. Funeral arrangement had not been completed at the time of publication. ••'•. • '" ' •• .,\ eg |
