Maxine Smith, 92


MAXINE SMITH

Ozark County native Maxine Smith, 92, of Mountain Home, Arkansas, formerly of Howards Ridge, died July 31, 2020, at Good Samaritan village in Mountain Home. A memorial service will be held at a later date.

She was born Sept. 30, 1927, in Mountain Home, the oldest of six children born to Chauncey and Ola Stone Clayton. She and her siblings were all raised in the Howards Ridge cabin her father built. Her grandmother, Lettie Jane Upton, also lived with them. She attended the one-room Howards Ridge school before attending Bakersfield High School for two years. Going to school meant riding in a neighbor friend’s Model A down to the North Fork of the White River then crossing the river in a small boat and hiking up the bluff to catch the school bus to Bakersfield. She transferred to Gainesville for her last two years of high school, graduating in 1944. Next, she attended what is now Missouri State University in Springfield and then taught in the New Home and Neverfail Schools back in Ozark County. 

On June 14, 1947, in St. John, Kansas, she married Obie Leon Smith. For many years, they lived and worked in Stafford, Kansas, and in 1967 moved to Goddard, and then Topeka, Kansas. Mrs. Smith went back to school to become a Licensed Practical Nurse, graduating second in her class. She worked as a nurse several years, and after she and her husband retired, they moved back home to Ozark County in 1993, settling on the 40 acres at Howards Ridge where she was raised, a homestead that is now a registered Missouri Century Farm. 

She loved the Lord and was member of Lilly Ridge Baptist church 

She is survived by her two children, Marsha Smith Hallam and husband Curt of Kenai, Alaska, and Mack Smith of Centralia; four grandsons, Austin and Sean Smith and Christopher and Steven Hallam; and 11 great-grandchildren.

 She was preceded in death by her parents; her husband, who died in August 1998; her siblings, Charlie Clayton, Geneva Marotta, Jesse Clayton, Deloise Honeycutt and Frank Clayton.

Burial will be at Smith Chapel Cemetery. Memorial contributions may be made to the  Humane Society of North Central Arkansas, 265 N. Highway 201, Mountain Home, AR 72653.

Local arrangements by Clinkingbeard Funeral Home, Gainesville.

Ozark County Times

504 Third Steet
PO Box 188
Gainesville, MO 65655

Phone: (417) 679-4641
Fax: (417) 679-3423