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Restland Funeral Home obituary
13005 Greenville Avenue
Dallas, TX 75243
469.925.1436

Lee H Smith
Birth Date: January 7, 1935 Death Date: September 19, 2018

Lee H. Smith was born January 7, 1935 in Ector, TX. He is preceded in death by Eva, his wife of fifty-plus years; his parents, Lee H and Willie Mae Morrison Smith; sister, Beulah Eloise Smith; brother-in-law and sister, Ben and Dorothy Smith Colvin; two brothers, Vaughan Ray (Buddy) and Jimmy Paden Smith. He was a member of Prestonwood Baptist Church, Plano, TX. Having professed his faith in Christ at a revival in Gober, TX at the age of eleven, and with strong and unwaving faith in God and steadfast in his Christian beliefs, he passed away at the age of 83 on September 19, 2018.

As a member of Prestonwood Baptist Church, he served on the Leadership Council of the Restorative Justice Ministries to prisons. He also served in Bill Glass’ Champions for Life prison ministry. He later established his own Christian mission through which he shared Christ one-on-one with individuals and encouraged and helped churches establish programs to encourage and teach members to share Christ.

He grew up early in Gober, Texas (also Fannin County), and attended the Dallas Public School System from 1949 to 1953, graduating as co-valedictorian from Sunset High School in 1953, where he was president of his class as well as the student body, holder of the Key of Knowledge, most popular boy, and an outstanding basketball player, being selected to the All City and All Greater Dallas basketball teams. He was elected to the Sunset High School Hall of Fame in 1975 and selected in 2012 by a Committee of Sunset graduates as one of the thirteen most outstanding graduates since the School was founded in 1928.

He traveled a virtually unique route through a highly successful, diverse, rigorous and balanced set of educational and career activities. He attended Texas A&M University on both academic and basketball scholarships. Immediately after receiving a B.S. degree in mathematics from A&M in 1957, he spent approximately ten years in the aircraft and missiles industry and the electronics industry in technically related capacities. During this timeframe, he earned a masters degree from Southern Methodist University in 1962 in engineering administration, at night, parallel with full-time employment at Texas Instruments, Inc. Later, during the same timeframe, he took a leave of absence from Ling Temco Vought, Inc., after being awarded a graduate studies fellowship from the company, for the purpose of pursuing doctoral studies, ultimately earning a PhD degree (the first ever awarded by the Department of Statistics) in mathematical statistics from A&M in 1964.

Later, in 2004, he was the recipient of the H. 0. Hartley Award, an award given to graduates of the Department of Statistics at Texas A&M for distinguished service to the discipline of statistics and was inducted into The Academy of Distinguished Former Students of the College of Science, Texas A&M. In 2013, at the 50-Year Celebration of the Department of Statistics, he was named one of9 Notable Alumni of the Department.

After one more year at Ling Temco Vought, he began a seventeen-year career in academics, serving as a professor and administrator at The University of Texas at Arlington, The University of Houston, and The University of Texas at Dallas, culminating his academic career by serving as President of Texas State University (then Southwest Texas State University) from 1974 to 1981. At age 39 at the time of his appointment, he became the youngest president of a major university in the U.S. His primary academic devotion was teaching, but he also compiled a noteworthy publication record in both national and international journals, conducted and managed major sponsored research, presented papers and lectures at professional meetings around the world, engaged in extensive technical and professional educational society activities, and compiled a long history, at national, state and local levels, of successful interactions with academic communities, educational associations, coordinating bodies, accrediting bodies and governmental bodies and agencies.

One of the hallmark accomplishments during the University service of Lee and his wife, Eva, was the acquisition of the adjoining San Marcos Baptist Academy Property, which increased the size of the Campus by 46%, adding 82 acres and 18 buildings. On July 19, 2014, Texas State University (formerly SWT) honored Eva and Lee for their many University contributions through the naming of the former Academy Property, subsequently called the West Campus, as the “Lee H. and Eva L. Smith West Campus”.

After the Presidency, he embarked on another successful, twenty-year-plus career in business, serving as President of Travelhost, Inc., Voyager Expanded Leaming, Inc., and Standard and Intercontinental Life Insurance Companies. During his two-year watch in the latter capacity, he was a key member of a management team that saw the parent company grow to a billion dollar set of insurance companies.

He provided management system consulting and seminars throughout his professional career to a large number of major companies, agencies, and universities across the United States. His combined experience in both profit and non-profit sectors included over three decades in developing, teaching, and applying management systems, a common thread throughout his professional career. He ultimately became co-inventor of a patented, universal management system.

A strong proponent of education throughout his life, he was co-founder and chairman of the Sunset Foundation, Inc., becoming Chairman Emeritus and having a scholarship named in his honor after devoting years to raising funds to help newly graduated students from Sunset attend college. Eva, his mate for over fifty years, and he established the perpetual Eva L. and Lee H. Smith Scholarship Fund at A&M to provide stipends for graduate students in the Department of Statistics.

His heritage, spiritual grounding, positive values, strong family base and ties, and an indelibly engrained work ethic were among blessings that he held dear. He never forgot where he came from and was ever thankful for the roots of his background and training. Even though he was a family-first person, he also had a very special love for and allegiance to Gober, the town in which he spent his childhood and early teens, as well a Dallas Sunset High School and Texas A&M. Even under a hectic schedule as President of Texas State University, he cautioned his staff repeatedly that the red carpet was to be rolled out to any and all visits and calls involving persons from these constituencies. He developed, cultivated, and cherished throughout his life a multitude of close and lasting relationships with these and others from all over the Country.

He was extremely positive about life, a trait that was constantly displayed in his hallmark grin and through his ability to counsel others. He used these attributes to soften his early-career, no-nonsense approach to stewardship in both academics and business. Along the way, he became a consummate manager and outstanding leader in both sectors.

A highly gifted athlete, he loved to watch and play basketball from the time when, at five years old, he began to watch the Gober Plowboys. Later, he played in elementary school, junior high, high school, college and industrial leagues. At age forty he “retired” from basketball while playing in the City league in San Marcos. Displaying his modesty and ability to laugh at himself, he was quoted at the time that “it wasn’t cool for the head of the largest industry in the County to make a fool of himself every Thursday night”.

In spite of several health difficulties over the years, including a 35 yea battle with renal cell carcinoma cancer, he continued a healthful lifestyle, regularly stretching, running, exercising, engaging in strength conditioning, and returning to basketball in his sixties as a participant in Senior Olympics, even playing on a State Championship Team for two consecutive years. With a keen sense of humor, he also countered stress related to the health difficulties with his ability to be playful, relax and savor family and friends.

He will be dearly missed, leaving behind a special void in the lives of family and friends, one made bearable only by his legacy of unconditional love and loyalty to them.

He is survived and dearly loved by son-in-law and daughter, Tom and Diette Smith Barnett; son, Don Adkins; son and daughter-in-law, Gary and Donna Adkins; sister-in-law, Jane Smith Williams; a host of grandchildren, great grandchildren, nieces, nephews, grandnieces, grandnephews and other relatives and friends.

Services will be held at Restland Funeral Home, North Greenville Avenue, Dallas, TX. There will be a visitation from 6:30 PM to 8:30 PM on Friday, September 28, 2018. A celebration of life will be held at 11:30 AM on Saturday, September 29, 2018 at Restland Memorial Chapel.

It was Lee’s wish that, in lieu of flowers, donations be made to the Sunset Foundation, 102 South Plymouth Road, Dallas, TX 75211, or the Gober Cemetery Association, 5920 FM 68, Wolfe City, TX 75496.

Visitation
September 28, 20186:30 pm - 8:30 pm
Restland Funeral Home
13005 Greenville Avenue Dallas TX, 75243

Celebration of Life
September 29, 201811:30 am
Memorial Chapel at Restland Funeral Home
13005 Greenville Ave. Dallas, Texas 75243