Background on Smith, Hollis A.
Hollis Ayer Smith was born in Haverhill, Massachusetts, on March 14, 1903, the son of Bertha (Charlestworth) Smith and Fred A. Smith, a manufacturer of leather counters for the shoe industry. After graduating from the University of Maine in 1925 and earning a Masters of Forestry from Harvard (1928), Smith set out to build a career as a forester. After the Martha's Vineyard State Forest was established in 1925, he was appointed forest superintendent, overseeing work on planting and fire line construction, but in 1927, he became a student again, working under A. C. Cline at the Harvard Forest in Petersham, Mass. On the side, he maintained a private consulting business, with clients from Cape Cod to New Hampshire.
Smith's business, however, never really prospered. By 1930, he informed a friend, Lawrence Rathbun, that with consulting work drying up, he would return to the Vineyard to focus on surveying, keeping forestry as a sideline. By the time of the 1940 federal census, Smith was recorded as living in Tisbury and working as a manager of a golf course. He died in Tisbury on February 6, 1988.
Scope of collection
This collection contains correspondence, job reports, and ephemera from Hollis Smith's relatively brief career as a consulting forester in Massachusetts. Nearly half of the collection consists of correspondence with clients (or potential clients), with a few interesting reports on properties: detailing the space, planting proposals, plans for maintaining the condition of the property, and concerns for dealing with insect or fungal infestation.
Smith's clients included both private landowners and organizations such as the Central New England Sanatorium in Rutland, Mass., with the majority located in the Cape and Islands, central Massachusetts, and New Hampshire. The collection also includes some correspondence and ephemera relating to meetings of professional forestry associations in the early 1930s.
Inventory
Booklets and
1928-1938
Box 1: 1
Describing and documenting soil conditions. Washington, D.C. : US Department of Agriculture
undated
Mulford, Furman Lloyd, Trees for roadside planting. Washington, D.C. : US Department of Agriculture
1928
Shea, H. J., Lectures in geodesy. S.l. : s.n.
ca.1927
Thompson, A. Robert, Tree bracing. Washington, D.C. : US Department of the Interior
1938
Time book [record of work, with hours and description of the job]
1927
Canadian Society of Forest Engineers
1930
Box 1: 2
Clive, A.C.
1930-1932
Box 1: 3
Consulting work: Barraclough, K.E.
1929
Box 1: 4
Consulting work: Biglow, R.L.
1931
Box 1: 5
Consulting work: Braley, Abner L.
1931
Box 1: 6
Consulting work: Carpenter, Irving F.
1929
Box 1: 7
Consulting work: Cleveland, Mather, with report on the Colby Homestead Farm, New London, N.H.
1929-1930
Box 1: 8
Consulting work: Crane, Bayard T.
1928-1932
Box 1: 9
Consulting work: Crane, Bayard T. with report on the Central New England Sanatorium
ca.1929-1932
Box 1: 10
Consulting work: Crane, W. C.
1930
Box 1: 11
Consulting work: Fisher, Georgina P., with report on the Franklin lot of Georgina Fisher, Petersham, Mass.
1930
Box 1: 12
Consulting work: Freemont, N.H. (town)
1930
Box 1: 13
Consulting work: Gregg, Harry A.
1929
Box 1: 14
Consulting work: Hatch, Horace, with report on property of Joseph Higgins, Barre, Mass.
1929
Box 1: 15
Consulting work: Kinnicutt, Roger
1929-1932
Box 1: 16
Consulting work: Makepeace, John
1930
Box 1: 17
Consulting work: Mixter, Charles G.
1929-1930
Box 1: 18
Consulting work: Morse, Charles L.
1930-1931
Box 1: 19
Consulting work: Pratt, Ernest
1930
Box 1: 20
Consulting work: Putnam, Tracy J., with report on the Washburn estate, Middleboro, Mass.
1929-1931
Box 1: 21
Consulting work: Taft, Clarence M.
ca.1930
Box 1: 22
Consulting work: Windsor, Frederick
1929 Oct-1931
Box 1: 23
Consulting work: Whittlemore, Lewis
1931
Box 1: 24
Cook, H.O.
1931-1932
Box 1: 25
Correspondence
ca.1929-1932
Box 1: 26
DePont de Nemours and Company
1930
Box 1: 27
Essex National Bank
1928-1930
Box 1: 28
Fisher, R.F.
1929-1932
Box 1: 29
Herr, Clarence S.
1929
Box 1: 30
MacAloney, H.J.
1930-1932
Box 1: 31
Miller, Paul J.
1931
Box 1: 32
Newspaper clippings
ca.1930
Box 1: 33
Nurseries: miscellaneous ephemera
ca.1930
Box 1: 34
Nurseries: prices
1928-1933
Box 1: 35
Nurseries: shipping notices
1931-1932
Box 1: 36
Paramenter, R.B.
1910 Oct-1942
Box 1: 37
Rathbun, Lawrence W.
1929-1930
Box 1: 38
Reynolds, Harris
1929-1930
Box 1: 39
Society of American Foresters
1929-1931
Box 1: 40
Society of American Foresters: New England section
1928-1933
Box 1: 41
Society of American Foresters: reports
1929-1932
Box 1: 42
Administrative information
Search terms
Subjects
- Foresters--Massachusetts
- Sharon (Mass.)--Economic conditions--19th century.
Contributors
- Smith, Hollis A. [main entry]
- Smith, Hollis A.
