Joy of Medina County Magazine | April 2019
Even as a child, Smalley was driven by a deep passion and fascination with history, unlike his younger siblings, Pamela and Dave. “When I was a kid, for some reason, I really enjoyed history, even when I was 8 years old. I was always fascinated by stories of what people had done in the past,” Smalley said. Perhaps his love of history comes from the stories of his family, which has deep roots in the Medina area and America’s history. He is related to several old Medina families, including those with the last name of Washburn, Bradway (as in Bradway Creek), and Webber. Smalley’s mother was Jane Arndt. Smalley traced his mother’s paternal family back to a Hessian drummer boy who came to America during the Revolutionary War. Hessians were German troops hired by the British to fight Americans. A er the war, the boy had the chance to return to Germany but chose to stay in the U.S. Arndt’s maternal side of the family was part of the Webber family, who arrived in Medina in 1838. The Webber family specialized in casting and liquid metal work and started the Holloware Foundry, located in Hinckley. Smalley said that Foundry Street in Medina is named a er the foundry. Sometime in the 1840s, one of the Webbers, who was a blacksmith in the foundry, was killed when a bolt of lightning traveled down the foundry’s chimney and struck him. Eventually, the Webbers sold the foundry to John Smart. John Smart’s name may be familiar because his house, at the corner of Liberty and Elmwood in Medina, is the current home of the Medina County Historical Society. Smalley’s mother was born in a home on West Friendship Street in 1920, during a blizzard. She graduated from Medina High School in 1938. His father was born in England, 50 miles north of London, during a powerful storm. Storm waters had flooded the first floor of the house, so his father was born on the second floor. The Smalleys came to the U.S. and settled in Cleveland following WWI. A er Smalley’s father returned to America following his service in World War II, his mother and father stayed with Smalley’s grandmother in
5
Married less than a year, Benn and Jane Smalley, parents of Roger Smalley, stroll together in San Antonio, Texas, in 1942. Benn was completing training in the U.S. Army Air Corp and would soon be transferred to the Pacific Theater where he would serve in Australia; the Philippines; Okinawa; and, finally, in Japan itself. Photo provided.
Cleveland. During the time they lived in Cleveland, Smalley was born at Glenville Hospital, which was demolished shortly a er his birth, fitting for a boy whose parents were both born during intense storms. “A er me, they tore it down,” Roger says, with a chuckle. It is a little bit of a twist on the old saying that a er someone is born, “they broke the mold.” He majored in history at Muskingum University in New Concord, Ohio, the hometown of astronaut John Glenn, who also had attended the university. Smalley would o en see Glenn jogging on the track, and the two would exchange greetings. Smalley earned his teaching degree, following that up with getting his masters at the University of Akron. He began teaching in 1970. Then, one day at church, Linda Hamilton caught continued, Page 6 his eye.