Gary Smith was born in 1940 in the Sequim Hospital now Discovery Memory Care on Washington Street to Arvie and Dottie Smith. Arvie was the first Smith from Alabama to immigrate to Sequim in 1935.
Gary’s family moved often in his first six years while dad was working in the woods. His parents purchased his grandfather Bennett’s farm at 113 Mill Road in Carlsborg where Gary grew up and developed an appreciation for cows and soils, with and without rocks.
He was active in Future Farmers of America and had an interest in being an Agriculture teacher until being introduced to Chemistry by Mrs. Sarah Scott and pursued that at the University of Puget Sound with a Bachelors of Science.
He and Janice “Jan” Schmuck married in 1960 and they learned how to pinch pennies on her dental assistant salary of $250 per month.
Gary couldn’t wait to get to work and ended up working for Reichold Chemical in Tacoma and then Rayonier Pulp in Port Angeles for five years.
At this point Jan’s folks were ready to retire and Gary said he could still remember the best parts of the dairy and farm work, so he and Jan took the route of “more guts than brains” and were in the dairy business and ended up as dinosaurs in Sequim farming.
Today, it takes their four children plus a grandson to manage the farm with Troy doing the crops, Ben the dairy, Wendy helping with the bookkeeping while keeping a full time nursing job, Anthony works at Microsoft after 21 years in the U.S. Navy, and grandson Jake manages the 100-cow beef herd.
All four Smith children attended Sequim High School and attended universities ending with two Cougars and two Huskies.
Of our nine grandchildren many have worked and played on the farm, and 4-H and FFA have played a big part of their younger years.
Gary’s family has been active in the Methodist Church their entire lives. Gary has been a director on several boards — Clallam Co-Op, Northwest Farm Credit Services, and currently the Sequim Prairie Tri-Irrigation Ditch. He’s also been active in water conservation through participation in the Sequim Bay Water Management Plan, the Dungeness Comprehensive Water Management Plan, and the more recent Dungeness Water Rule and re-adjudication of the irrigation water rights for the Dungeness River.
His current interests include helping out when and wherever I can on the farm, restoring a ’67 Mustang, watching Fox News, and traveling with family knowing the farm is well taken care of in my absence.
He and Jan thank the Pioneer Committee for this honor and also thank the whole community for the support of their family and farm over the years.
“Where we are today is a result of your support, the work of our parents and a lot of hard work in our two generations,” Gary said.