Robert Virgil Smith

Robert Virgil
Smith
PRINCETON, NJ
Robert Virgil Smith died peacefully at his home in Princeton on February 12, 2015. Born on February 28, 1920, in St. Charles, Iowa, he was the third son of John Guy and Veta Payne Smith. The family moved to Des Moines when he was in the sixth grade, and he graduated from Roosevelt High School. He earned a Bachelor of Science and Commerce degree in economics and business administration from the State University of Iowa in 1941. He continued his education at Garrett-Evangelical Theological Seminary in Evanston, Illinois, and was ordained as a Methodist minister in 1944. In 1945, Bob married his first wife, Rosalind "Posy" Walls, a recent graduate of Northwestern University, at the First Church in Evanston, Illinois. They moved to New Haven, Connecticut, where Bob was the pastor of Grace Methodist Church while he studied at Yale. He earned his Ph.D. in contemporary theology from Yale in 1953. Robert Smith started his teaching career at Cornell College in Mount Vernon, Iowa, in 1948. In 1952, he moved to Colgate University in Hamilton, New York, where he had an extraordinary impact on students in his position as Chaplain and Professor of Philosophy and Religion. In his thirty-six years at Colgate University, he taught courses in philosophy of religion, introduction to religion, contemporary Christian thought, and business ethics. He spent two sabbaticals studying at Mansfield College at Oxford University in England, in 1962 and 1967-68. He directed study groups in Great Britain and Africa and served as director of the Overseas Study Group Program at Colgate. In 1980, he was named to the Harry Emerson Fosdick Chair in the Department of Philosophy and Religion. The Colgate Alumni Corporation awarded him its Distinguished Teaching Award in 1987. R. V. Smith was active in the National Association of Biblical Instructors, serving as President in 1961 and as chair of the Self-Study Committee that resulted in the founding of the American Academy of Religion. In 1970-71, he was director of planning for a center for Religion and Society of the State University of New York at Stony Brook. In 1982-83, he served as chaplain for the Protestant Cooperative Ministry at Cornell University in Ithaca, New York. Dr. Smith maintained his standing as a United Methodist pastor for more than 45 years. In addition to serving as chaplain at Colgate, he served as summer minister for years at the Grindstone Island United Methodist Church in the Thousand Islands. He and his family spent summers living at the parsonage, and the family still maintains a cottage on the island. R. V.'s first wife, Posy, died in 1978 after 33 years of marriage. Posy had her Ph.D. in English Literature from Syracuse University. In 1980, he married Joyce Louise Irwin, a scholar, author, organist, and musician with a Ph.D. in Religious Studies from Yale. After R. V.'s retirement in 1988, he and Joyce lived in Oneida and Syracuse, New York, and Princeton, New Jersey. They also traveled the world, visiting such diverse places as Egypt, Pakistan, Burundi, and China, and living in Germany, the Netherlands, and England. He is survived by his wife, Joyce Irwin, and his three children from his first marriage, Deborah Smith, of Hamilton and Grindstone Island, New York, Brian Smith and his wife, Carol Smith, of Haddonfield, New Jersey, and Lisa Smith and her husband, William Bowen, of South Salem, New York. He is also survived by five grandchildren, Robert Bikwemu, Jeffrey Smith, Katherine Smith, J. T. Bowensmith, and Kinsey Bowensmith; his mother-in-law, Dorothy Hemphill; and a niece, Sally Griffin. A memorial service to celebrate the life of Robert Virgil Smith will be held at 11 a.m. on February 28, 2015, at Plainsboro Presbyterian Church. Another service will be planned in Hamilton, New York, in the spring. The family requests that donations in lieu of flowers be made to Grindstone Island United Methodist Church, Clayton, NY 13624, or to Colgate University, Gift Records, 13 Oak Drive, Hamilton, NY 13346, to be directed to the Chaplain's Office.