Lillie Dale Baker Smith
Written by Lillie
Smith in 1963
Lillie Dale Baker Smith, daughter of Thomas J and Minerva R Baker, was born Sunday, March 12, 1876 and lived all her life in the Grants Lick precinct. She started to school at the age of five years and told her parents on returning home that evening that she wanted to be a teacher and stuck to it. In time as the years went by, she assisted her teacher teach, so they could have time to teach her the higher branches, Latin, Astronomy, Algebra, etc.
At that time there were no high schools in the county. She took the teachers examination and obtained a first class certificate and taught 14 terms of school, all grades in a one room building. her largest school was at Grants Lick, 89 pupils. She had 36 classes per day, her salary was $40 per month and she worked hard to earn that much money.
She was united in marriage with Jesse B Smith, a highly respected citizen, and much loved funeral director which profession she considered next best to teaching. She assisted with the work almost fifty years, kept records, etc. and helped with all arrangements and drove the car. They were both Notary Publics, bought and sold several farms and served as administrators for several estates.
For many years she kept books for the Oakland
Cemetery Company,
helped people with their income taxes, obtained certified copies of birth
certificates
for hundreds of people. She was first President of the first Red Cross,
PTA and
Missionary Society at Grants Lick. She was a member of the Baptist Church
the Daughters of America, and Democratic Committee woman for many
years. She was a foster mother to a boy from the age 13. She did all
the good she could, to all the people she could. Every thing in life is a
venture of
faith; helping others is the rent we pay for our room on this earth. She
was the
correspondent for the Falmouth Outlook. She was a Sunday School
teacher
most of her life.
Lillie Dale Baker Smith died May 19, 1966 in Alexandria. She was 90 years old.
In 1963 she wrote the following history of the Grants Lick Baptist Church.
Now a brief history of our Grants Lick Baptist Church which was organized in 1859 at Plum Creek. Later the church was moved to the present location. The tract of ground was given for the building by Mr. Clary. It was a one room structure with home made seats. In the year 1894, a frame building on the spot where the present building now stands was built. Worship services were conducted in this building, a one room structure until the year 1950.
On June 5, a contractor, Jesse Wilson began the remodeling of this one room building and on July 1, 1951, the building, consisting of an educational plant of 15 classrooms, furnace room, two rest rooms, kitchen, baptistery, and auditorium were dedicated. Brother James R Armstrong was pastor at that time.
(In 1963) There were 399 resident members. Brother R Gene Livingood was the present pastor. The church formerly faced the east and now faces the north. The Oakland Cemetery is on the west and south. Among early pastors were Brothers J A Jolly, B S Akers, Jesse W Beagle, Brother Wilson and Brother Brown.