Charles Sprague Smith

Charles Sprague Smith was born in Andover, Massachusetts, in 1853. He was graduated from Amherst College in 1874 and received the Master’s degree a year later. He then went to Europe and studied for five years in the Universities of Berlin, Oxford, Rome, Paris, Madrid, and Copenhagen and later in Iceland. He purposed devoting himself to the study of comparative literature.

Returning to this country in 1880, he was professor in Columbia University until 1891 and then lecturer in various colleges for five years. In 1896 he organized the Comparative Literature Society. The following year he formed the People’s Institute and gave to it the remainder of his life. It was his cherished idea, an expression of his inmost purpose; it was non-partisan, non-political, non-sectarian; an organization of the people and for the people; thoroughly democratic yet fully cognizant of the needs and ignorance of a democracy, it afforded a free forum for instruction with an opportunity for the expression of all opinions. He made it a powerful agency for reform, and many times its influence was felt in public decisions. The People’s Institute was more than a free forum, for Mr. Smith originated many plans for the education and the development of the people; but beyond all plans and agencies his personality was the effective power. His familiarity with many literatures won for him the respect and admiration of the people of the East Side, and in an extraordinary degree he enjoyed the confidence of diverse elements. Not a Socialist, he had the warm regard of Socialists, not a member of a trades-union, he was the trusted adviser of trades-unionists. In closest fellowship with men active in these diverse groups he commanded also the support of capitalists; affiliated with no political party, he influenced parties and law makers. Possessed by a great ideal, he was too deeply in earnest for the relaxations of ordinary social life. There was in him the quality of the prophet, and he died while still his visions were unrealized. Through such men is the republic to be made the embodiment and realization of the faith of the fathers—that the people are not only of a right their own rulers but that they are worthy of the trust.

George William Knox
1911 Century Association Yearbook