Dr. Roy Nicholson Smith, Jr., a dentist in Atlanta for almost 40 years, was raised on an Alabama farm with no electricity or indoor plumbing. He often missed as much as the first eight weeks of school to help his family with the harvest.
But he always caught up, and eventually graduated first in his class from Hokes Bluff High School, and then again first in his class from Emory Dental School in 1952, his son, Dr. Nick Smith said.
Smith, who was born in 1923 on Christmas Day in Piedmont, Ala., died July 5 of congestive heart failure and pneumonia. He was 89.
Smith’s first job was at a hamburger restaurant, and he remembered the order, a Schlitz beer and a burger with fries, for a customer three times in a row. The customer turned out to be a manager at Goodyear Tires, and offered Smith a job at his plant where he worked for almost a year before he was drafted into the Army.
Smith trained to be an airplane mechanic while serving in the Army from May 1944-Sept. 1945, but was never sent abroad, said his son.
When he returned home, his manager at Goodyear Tires encouraged him to apply for college. Smith moved to Atlanta to attend Emory University but he never graduated because he was accepted into Emory Dental School after two years.
Smith had gained a reputation for his ability to learn quickly, and was recruited as the first and only dentist at The Emory Clinic, where he also made prosthetic ears and noses for his patients from 1953 until 1984.
He met his wife of 61 years, Frances DeVane, during his senior year of dental school when she was working as an x-ray technician. They raised four children in Atlanta.
In 1985, Smith joined his son, who had become a dentist himself, at his private dental practice in Brookhaven, where they worked together for seven years.
“It was great working with my dad. When he came to join me, he was a great wealth of knowledge, he would give me suggestions, and we would bounce things off of each other,” Nick Smith said.
Smith cleaned the teeth of hundreds of Atlantans, including those of Coca-Cola executives George and Robert Woodruff, and even after he retired, kept in touch with how his patients were doing, said his son.
Roy Smith retired in 1992, and moved to the Leafmore Creek Park neighborhood in Decatur, where he continued to hunt, play tennis, create jewelry and stained glass trash cans.
“He came from basically nothing,” said his son, who said that as a child, his father used to shoot rabbits and sell them to neighbors for 25 cents for pocket money, and continued to hunt quail and doves throughout his life.
“He used to throw a softball up in the air and teach me how to shoot it with a B.B. Gun,” Nick Smith said.
In addition to his son, Smith is survived by his wife, and daughters Suzanne Hall of Falls Church, Va., Melissa Zerillo of Nashville, Tenn., and Amanda Boor of Tallahassee, Fla., and six grandchildren.
A memorial service will be held on Sunday, July 14, at 2 p.m. at Glenn Memorial United Methodist Church on the Emory University Campus, 1600 N Decatur Road, Atlanta, 30307. There will be reception following the service.
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