Artist
William Brantley Smith, 1874-1947Date made
1906Notes
William Brantley Smith was born in Lascassas, Tennessee near Murfreesboro in 1874. He was one of five children born to Sampson Barry Smith and Margaret A. McAdoo Smith. Brantley studied in New York under Frank V. DuMond, Robert Henri, F. Louis Mora and William Merritt Chase at the Chase School of Art, where he was a scholarship student and graduate. In January 1906, he married Christine Priest. They lived for a time in Newport, Rhode Island before returning to Nashville. During the first part of the twentieth century, Mr. Smith followed the “Resort Circuit” painting and/or maintaining studios in New York City; Newport, RI; Palm Beach and Boca Raton, FL; and Lake Placid, New York. In addition to portrait and still-life painting, he illustrated for magazines and publications of the Baptist Sunday School Board. During World War I, he served as a Recreation Director for the Y.M.C.A. in France in leave areas. In this capacity, he sang and entertained soldiers as well as sketched many portraits of soldiers to be mailed home to their families. He stayed in France for a year after the War painting in and around Aix Les Bains and along the Riviera. In addition to his ability to capture what he saw and record it for posterity on canvas, Brantley Smith was a gifted musician and a soloist in several Nashville and area churches for many years. His repertoire was not limited to religious songs, and he was often called upon to entertain those present at social gatherings. The landscape, still life and portrait painter maintained a studio in Monteagle, TN for many years and was head of the Art Department at the Monteagle Sunday School Assembly (MSSA). Monteagle is located between Nashville and Chattanooga, Tennessee along the Appalachian Chain reaching from north Georgia up into New England. The Monteagle Assembly began in 1882 and has been a favorite destination since its inception for a place to repose from daily life. The Assembly was “an outgrowth of the nineteenth century Sunday School Movement, patterned after the Chautauqua Sunday School Assembly at Lake Chautauqua, New York. It became a part of the ‘Chautauqua Movement’ which swept the country during the last quarter of the nineteenth century and the first quarter of the twentieth. Most other ‘Chautauquans’ were started by individual church denominations. From its beginning, Monteagle was ecumenical, this at a time when rivalry between religious denominations was bitter and keen. Today, Monteagle remains true to its Chautauquan heritage, still combining religion, education, art, theater, discussions on literary and public affairs, and wholesome summer relaxation in a pleasant mountain setting.” His first studio on the Monteagle Assembly grounds burned in 1941, destroying a large collection of his paintings. He moved to another location and for the remainder of his life, painted with fervor to replace the works of art destroyed by the fire. William Brantley Smith died on August 1, 1947, at age 73 in Emerald Hodgson Hospital at Sewanee, Tennessee following a heart attack.