The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1898-01-27
SMITHS IRON HOME.
Pen Picture of an Eccentric New Jer-
sey Statesman.

y ~ d.
Mail and Express.
The statement that the model village of
Smithville, near Mount Holly, y. j., Will
be wiped out and cut up into house lots for
the benefit of the heirs of the late HeZeklah
B. Smith brings before the public the life
and remarkable career Of the founder of
Hezekiah B. Smith, throughout his seven
ty-seven years of existence, was always
busy. His worst enemies never accused
him of sloth. Smith combined with all the
ShreWdnesS and taste for mechanical inven-
ton of the typical New, England Yankee
tendency toward remarkable and eccen-
trio extravaganza. He was in no sense a
spendthrift. He simply INDUCED his odd
fancies to their limit, and from the begin
careless of the comments or cenSure OF any
community in which he happened to live.
Heedlessly he went his way, man of great
force, many weaknesses and intense and
dominant individuality.
Hezekiah b. Smith was born in Wood
stock, VT, in 1916. He was a farmers son,
but soon wearied of blowing the rocky pas
lures of Vermont and learned the trade of
carpenter Very early in life his inventive
chiefly in its capacity to utilize the invent
I've abilities of others. At length, through
industry and thrift, he managed to become
the owner of number OF patents and eS-
tablished a machine shop in Woodstock.
He then married Eveline Verona English,
clipping to Boston for the purpose. He re-
prospecting, he removed to Manchester,
Mass, then to Boston, and thence to Low
IL,
He was at this time forty years of age
His eldest son, Elton, boy of fourteen,
went with him, but his wife and his daugh~
ter and his two younger sons remained in
Woodstock, Smith and his wife's relations
having quarreled on account of her mar
riage with him he positively forbade her
seeing any of her own family, but when her
father died she went to comfort her mother.
Her mother gave her a shawl. Smith came
home took one look at the shawl, left the
house and never saw his wife again.
In the meantime Smith became interested
in a young woman of the name of Agnes
Silkerson; at that time school girl in
Lowell. She became his amanuensis, and
wishing that she might be able to earn her
own living at some more profitable occupa-
ton, he paid to have her educated as a
doctor. And a doctor she became.
Smith then moved to Shoeville, N. j. He
bought the whole town and rechristened it
Smithville,. where he had scope to carry out
his own ideas of how Hezekiah b. Smith
ought to live. He bought an old square
brick mansion, probably seventy or eighty
himself. He built an L which, in the base
ment, was, and still is. combination ale
vault and bowling alley, the ale vault occu-
plying one side of the basement and the
bowling alley the other Over this base
ment was a poker room, absolutely conse-
Grated to Mr.. Smiths favorite pastime of
draw poker
But the cardinal popularity about the in
side OF the house and bowling alley was
of furniture stood on iron legs. There were
iron rungs to the bannsters, iron girders
across the ceilings, iron dogs and lions in
the front yard, iron baskets hung from the
piazza roof, even the clothes poles in the
back yard were made of iron; and in the
poker room, at Mr.. Smiths favorite seat,
there was a movable iron foot rest which
worked on pivot for Mr.. Smiths game"
leg.
In this ironclad home Mr. Smith installed
himself and his belongings, and then sent
for Miss Silkerson to come and act as his
combined housekeeper, doctor and amanu-
ensis. Miss Silkerson at once became pew
in fhn Itfaic AfNCI Of nat
Holly: and proceeded to put to practical
test, in the surrounding country side, her
particular fad of hygienic food, Smith
Smith and ali the inhabitants of Smithville
and its suburbs subsisted upon patent and
unpalatable food
In the meantime Smith ran for Congress
In the Second New Jersey district, and was
defeated, but was elected two years later,
He subsequently became state senator. All
this time. twenty-five years in all, Mrs.
Smith had been supporting herself and her
Elton Smith, the eldest son, after
stormy scene in which his father repudiated
him, shipped before the mast. became a
came one of its leading citizens.
In January, 1881, Agnes Silkerson died,
and Hezekiah Smith at once had a statue of
her made in Italy, brought it to this coun-
try and set it up in Smithville. Then feeling
himself growing old and needing care, he
imported a couple of elderly maiden ladies
from Philadelphia to look after him in his
declining years. But the rules of diet set
down by Dr. Agnes Silkerson were rigidly
adhered to, and the elder ladies had to suf-
fer on hygienic food with the rest of Smith
vile
Hezekiah b. Smith died on Nov 8, 1897
and left all bis estate, real and personal
for the establishment and conduct of
school for the education and training of ap-
prentices and young mechanics at Mount
Holly.
His widow and children filed an appeal on
the ground that at the time of his death he
was mentally incapacitated. After years of
litigation the suit has been decided in their
favor, and now Smithyille will so out of ex-
istence and only the iron house will stand
as a monuk lent to the memory of an eccen-
trio man.