TG Smith and his wife and daughter came to this area in about 1881. He died 15 Jan 1883 and was buried in a small cemetery in San Antonio Heights. After his death his wife and daughter returned ‘to the east’ where Mrs. Smith’s family had an ‘iron works’. His daughter possibly studied at the Chicago Art Institute and became an artist of some significance, using the name TG Smith. In the mid-1950’s she visited this area for a showing at the Claremont Colleges and to search for her father’s grave. An article appeared in the newspaper in 1969 telling about the Weiland family finding TG’s tombstone on their property and a few other details of the story.
We are searching for more details and want to better identify this Smith family. According to the article, Mr. Smith attended college with the Chaffey brothers in Canada. He came here because of ill-health. We don’t know what the initials TG stand for. We don’t know his wife’s name or where she was from. We don’t know where ‘in the east’ she returned to with her daughter. In another article written about 1977, it indicated that TG’s daughter (the artist) also had a daughter, so it is likely she was married, but this is another mystery. Perhaps she used the name “TG Smith” in her artwork as a pseudonym. The same articles indicate she ‘inherited’ the ironworks from her mother’s family.
TG’s tombstone is located at Bellevue Cemetery, in section A, but they have no record of an interment there.
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