Obituaries

Murray Smart, Jr.

Photo of Murray Smart, Jr.
Long-time U of A professor and Fayetteville resident, Murray Smart Jr., died Tuesday, August 9, 2016 after a long illness. Murray was born on August 8, 1933 in Blytheville, Arkansas, the son of Clifton Murray and Elizabeth Smart. He graduated as valedictorian of the 1951 class of Blytheville High School. He received a Fellowship to Tulane University, from which he graduated in 1956 with a Master of Architecture degree. At Tulane he was a member of Sigma Alpha Epsilon Fraternity. As the first ranked student in his class he received a scholarship to travel in Europe for three months between his fourth and fifth years of study. He entered the graduate program in City Planning and Urban Design at the University of Illinois the following year, but his graduate work was interrupted by army service. He served as a company commander of Company B, 127th Signal Battalion in Korea, before returning to finish his graduate degree. After three years of work in an architectural office in Blytheville, he was licensed to practice architecture. In 1966, Murray was invited to join the faculty of the Fay Jones School of Architecture at the University of Arkansas. A strong Christian, he always believed that his particular gift was teaching. He loved college students and his discipline and truly felt he had found his niche in life. He taught architectural design and his favorite subject area, architectural history, while maintaining a private practice in partnership with Gayl Witherspoon, a faculty colleague. In 1972-1973 he was awarded a Fulbright-Hays Professorship to teach at Kabul University in Afghanistan for one academic year. Upon his return to the University of Arkansas, he became assistant dean of the School, serving under E. Fay Jones. When Mr. Jones gave up the deanship to concentrate on private practice, Murray was named to the position. He served as dean from 1976-1991. Under his leadership the size of the school and its faculty more than doubled, the program leading to the Bachelor of Landscape Architecture degree was established, the School acquired the Lake Hamilton property that would become Garvan Woodland Gardens, and the program providing a semester of study in Rome for all architecture students was begun. Then Governor Bill Clinton appointed him to the State Board of Architects, on which he served two five-year terms. While on the board he was named to a task force of 15 architects to work with the Educational Testing Service in Princeton, New Jersey, to develop a computer-based computer-graded design examination that would be part of the national licensing examination for architects. This service led to the American Institute of Architects naming him a Fellow in the Institute, promotion to University Professor of Architecture, and the award of the U of A Alumni Association Faculty Award for Distinguished Teaching and Public Service. A scholar, as well as a teacher, he published a series of articles on English Victorian architecture and stained glass, provided a number of encyclopedia entries for the Dictionary of Architects and Architecture, and wrote the book Muscular Churches about English High Victorian churches of 1849-1875. After his return to full-time teaching, Murray was elected chair of the campus faculty. He served one year as the chair of the faculty, one year as the chair of the faculty senate, and two years as chair of the campus council. He also served on innumerable campus committees including two terms on the admissions and transfer of credit committee. He retired in 1998, but continued to teach the regular section and an honors section of Architecture Lecture (the general education core survey of architecture for the general student population) each semester. The slide library/media center in the School of Architecture was named the C. Murray Smart, Jr. Media Center in his honor. Murray was a deacon and a long-time Sunday school teacher at the First Baptist Church. He also served terms on the Board of the Humane Society and the North Arkansas Symphony. An avid reader of contemporary fiction, he enjoyed the Monday afternoon book club at the Fayetteville Public Library and the Rebels Book Club. He also gave tours of the Library to schoolchildren during the first few years after the completion of the new building. And he collected art books. He had a dry, sometimes caustic, wit, loved to tell jokes, and greatly enjoyed his friends, many of whom had been his students. He was a visual person who particularly liked art museums and the theater. He also loved travel to see the buildings that he talked about in his lectures. With his wife, and sometimes his grandsons or friends, he traveled somewhere abroad almost every year. He is survived by his wife, Carolyn Jones Smart; two sons and two daughters-in-law, Clifton Murray Smart III and Gail Smart of Springfield, Missouri and John David Smart and Charla Smart of Dallas, five grandsons, Murray IV and his wife Amy, David, Jim, Duncan and Philip; three great-grandchildren, Addelaynie, Parker and Emery and two dogs, Scout and Georgi. He loved dogs completely and irrationally! Throughout his life, Murray regarded himself as the most fortunate of men. His wife of 57 years was his closest friend. Plus he had a firm belief in Christ, a family he loved devotedly and who loved him in return, and a career that gave him great pleasure. For him the glass was always "full up." The family asks that in lieu of flowers memorials be sent to the First Baptist Church, 20 E. Dickson, Fayetteville, Arkansas 72701 or to the C. Murray Smart Rome Traveling Scholarship (checks payable to the University of Arkansas Foundation), School of Architecture, University of Arkansas, Fayetteville, Arkansas 72701. Memorial service will be held at 2 p.m., Saturday, August 27, 2016 at First Baptist Church in Fayetteville with visitation in the chapel at 1 p.m., under the direction of Moore's Chapel. Interment will be in Fayetteville National Cemetery. To sign the online guest book, visit www.mooresfuneralchapel.com.

Published August 17, 2016

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