Daniel and Mary Smith

Daniel Smith

Born

Dec. 12, 1798

Died

March 5, 1879

Aged 80 Yrs. 2

Mo. & 23 Days

Mary 

Wife of 

Daniel Smith

Born

? 30, 1797

1869

Daniel and Mary Smith are my maternal third great grandparents.  They are buried in the Smith Brooks Family Cemetery in the Olive Branch Community of Union County, NC.

I read an article about Daniel in The Monroe Journal on microfilm in the Union County Public Library in Monroe, NC.  The article was printed on Tuesday, August 28, 1923, and reads as follows:

     "J. L. Brooks of Marshville is in possession of an arithmetic which was made by his great grandfather, Daniel Smith, in the years of 1812 to 1826.  Printed arithmetics are evidently very scarce at that time and the old gentleman, possessing more education than the average man of his age took it upon himself, probably at the request of his neighbors to compose and compile the rules and examples of arithmetic. 

    The leaves of the arithmetic are eight by thirteen inches in size and there are about eight hundred in number.  Addition, subtraction, division and multiplication are treated and the rules of interest, rebate, etc., are treated and especial attention was given to the double rule of three, which in recent years has been discarded by the use of algebraic equations.  

     The books was written indelibly with goose quill and ink and the work is well arranged.  It must have taken the old gentleman a good part of his time during the years of its completion to compile and arrange the work, since it is done with great neatness.  

     Mr. Smith was the grandsire of the late Dr. H. M. Brooks of Olive Branch, a cousin of the late Esq. A. J. Brooks and is connected with a large percent of the Brooks families of Union county.  He moved from Fayetteville to New Salem township and his work was evidently begun before making the change.  

     In the old arithmetic is a shoe pattern cut from an old Fayetteville Observer, the oldest paper in the  state, in the year 1830.  In this paper are some price quotations that sound interesting to folks who live in the good year 1923, when some of the things quoted at a ridiculously low price then cannot be had now at any price:

     Jamaica rum, $1.40 gallon; Windsor Island, 70 cents gallon, New England rum, 40 cents gallon; rice, 100 pounds $3.00; Liverpool salt, 60 cents bushel; leaf tobacco, 2 1-2cents per pound; wheat, 95 cents per bushel; whiskey, 40 cents gallon; Malaga wine, 70 cents gallon.  A number of other things are also listed that show how times have changed."  

I would love to find this "arithmetic."


Location map for the Smith Brooks Family Cemetery

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