Charles Bennett SMITH, Congress, NY (1870-1939)

SMITH, Charles Bennett, a Representative from New York; born in Sardinia, Erie County, N.Y., September 14, 1870; attended the district schools, and was graduated from Arcade Academy in 1886; engaged in agricultural pursuits, subsequently became a railroad telegraph operator, and later pursued newspaper work in Buffalo; reporter on the Buffalo Courier 1890-1893; became managing editor of the Buffalo Times in 1894; editor of the Buffalo Evening Enquirer and the Buffalo Morning Courier; appointed a member of the Buffalo Board of School Examiners and served two years as its chairman; elected as a Democrat to the Sixty-second and to the three succeeding Congresses (March 4, 1911-March 3, 1919); chairman, Committee on Foreign Affairs (Sixty-second Congress), Committee on Expenditures in the Department of Commerce (Sixty-fourth Congress), Committee on Patents (Sixty-fifth Congress); unsuccessful candidate for reelection in 1918 to the Sixty-sixth Congress; engaged in commercial and industrial pursuits in Buffalo, N.Y.; superintendent of Standards and Purchases, Albany, N.Y., from 1935 until his death in Wilmington Notch, Essex County, N.Y., May 21, 1939; interment in Mount Olivet Cemetery, Tonawanda, Erie County, N.Y.

Source: Biographical Directory of the United States Congress, 1771-Present