Lessie Smithgall: Philanthropist, Journalist & Friend to the Arts
By: Alumni Publications | Categories: In Memoriam
After graduating, she began work as an advertising copywriter for $10 a week at Atlanta radio station WGST. There she met her future husband, Charles Smithgall, who was an announcer. When Charles was hired by WSB, Smithgall followed at the insistence of general manager Lambdin Kay. Smithgall’s husband began to expand his reach, acquiring radio stations, and started WGGA in Gainesville in 1941. The Smithgalls then founded the Gainesville Daily Times January 26, 1947, after purchasing the weekly Gainesville Eagle.
Smithgall had written for the Atlanta Journal Sunday magazine along with such writers as Margaret Mitchell, Celestine Sibley, and Frank Daniel, and assumed a columnist’s role on the Gainesville paper. She would write about most anything in her Gainesville Times column, but focused on community happenings and local people, eventually wearing out her old Corona portable typewriter.
She also was a charter member of the Northeast Georgia Writers Club and member of American League of Pen Women.
The Smithgalls’ homeplace eventually became 1500 Habersham Drive, behind which were 185 acres of woods that reached across a cove of Lake Lanier to Cleveland Road. The property in 2001 became Atlanta Botanical Gardens, a Smithgall Woodland Legacy, a gift from Smithgall and her husband.
Her impact on the community and state is well documented, though she never boasted about it. In fact, she preferred their gifts be anonymous. Smithgall was one of the founders and first president of The Arts Council organized in 1970. The Smithgalls were recipients of the Ivan Allen Jr. Prize for Progress and Service, and she was the first Georgia Entertainment Arts and Legacy Award honoree.
She always modestly deferred when somebody credited her for founding the Peabody Awards, the broadcast journalism equivalent to print’s Pulitzer Prizes. However, it was her idea, and she did the research necessary for an appropriate sponsor. She credited her boss, Lambdin Kay, with following through with John Drewry, dean of the University of Georgia journalism school, to make the awards a reality.
Smithgall established the Charles T. Bailey and Elizabeth S. Watts chair at Georgia Tech for Zoo Atlanta in memory of her father and daughter.
In 2008, Smithgall wrote her “story,” as she called her memoirs as told to author Phil Hudgins. She titled it “I Took the Fork,” a reference to baseball great Yogi Berra’s famous quote, “When you come to a fork in the road, take it.” In the book, she said she wanted her life to make a difference. “I wanted to be Celestia ‘Lessie’ Bailey Smithgall, who is what she is, who kept the faith, who persevered, who did not take herself too seriously, who for the most part, lived a good life and did a little good along the way. I pray that I have been that person.” Those who have known her would agree that she has been that and more.
Besides her parents, Mrs. Smithgall was preceded in death by her husband, Charles, and daughter, Elizabeth “Bay” Smithgall Watts.
Survivors are sons, Charles Augustus Smithgall III (Sally “Griff” Griffitts Smithgall), John Frederick Smithgall (Elaine Edmondson Smithgall), and James Thurmond Smithgall; grandchildren, Charles “Chas” Augustus Smithgall IV (Lizeth “Liz” Arizmendi Smithgall), Meghan Griffitts Smithgall, Jessica Leigh Smithgall Crocker (Michael Crocker), Jonathan Frederick Smithgall, Jason Aaron Smithgall, David William Smithgall; great-grandchildren, William Aaron Smithgall, Charles “Carlos” Augustus Smithgall V, Sofia Griffitts Smithgall, Santiago Hector Smithgall, Jackson Ian Crocker.
