Mary Elizabeth Hosking

http://www.redlandsdailyfacts.com/general-news/20100729/smiley-desc...

Smiley descendant was 'family hub' By Joy Juedes, Staff Writer POSTED: 07/29/10, 12:01 AM PDT

Mary Elizabeth Smiley Hosking was showing friends the A.K. Smiley Public Library when director Larry Burgess saw her.

"It was quite by accident," said Burgess, who wrote a book about the Smiley family. "We were dedicating the Daniel Smiley children's wing. (I said) Hey, want to be part of the ceremony?"'

She signed the registry at the children's room dedication, he said.

"She was a very nice person, greatly interested in the history of the area but also very proud of being connected to the fact Alfred Smiley was president of the library board," Burgess said. "Once in awhile she'd drop me a note about something she'd find in her family history and genealogy."

Hosking, great-granddaughter of Alfred Smiley, died July 25 at her Riverside home. She was 87.

"Family was very, very important to her," said daughter Janet Brown. "I know I spent any important holiday in Redlands with relatives."

The family spent holidays and vacations together, she said.

Brown's mother, known as Betty, was proud of her family heritage - her great-grandfather's twin brother, Albert, founded the library, and both were involved in that and other causes in Redlands. Daniel Smiley, their younger half-brother, helped raise money to build an addition to the library that became the Young Readers' Room.

Mary Elizabeth Smiley was born to Howard Wyatt Smiley and Mabel Day Smiley on Dec. 5, 1922, in Glendale.

Howard Smiley worked in construction, so the family moved around Southern California. They moved to Redlands when Betty was in middle school, and she grew up on College Avenue, Brown said.

"I remember her talking about being mortified about her family keeping a goat," she said. "It was used by students up at (the University of Redlands) to play pranks on professors, so she was even more mortified the neighbors knew the Smileys had a goat."

She worked at the Plunge during the summers, before going away to UC Santa Barbara, where she received a bachelor's degree in home economics.

"I think one of the things that's fascinating about my family is college grads go back more than 100 years, so the tradition of education was prevalent," Brown said.

While attending First United Methodist Church during a spring break, a young man "caught her eye and he winked at her and asked her out," Brown said.

The young man was Russell Sloan Hosking, whose family owned citrus groves near where Citrus Valley High School is now. They wrote letters to each other while he worked stateside during the World War II years, Brown said.

"One of them said, I married the most beautiful girl in the world,"' she said. "We've all given them to our own husbands and say, You need to write letters like this."'

They were married May 27, 1943, at First United Methodist Church. Russell Hosking worked at the Redlands YMCA before being asked to help start a YMCA in Lakewood and later Riverside, where they lived for the last 47 years.

Betty raised their four children and returned to work later in life. For 25 years, she taught sewing and tailoring at Riverside Community College, and was promoted to chairwoman of the home economics department. She had a master's degree in home economics from Loma Linda University.

"She thought it was important to always wear things sewn by her," Brown said. "Every single suit she wore to work was tailored by her."

Her mother could sew anything, she said.

"She made my father a suit, her own wedding dress, mine and her first granddaughter's, she made all the drapes in the house, upholstered furniture."

She often bought patterns and tried recipes, son Jim Hosking said. She carried on the family tradition of making special cakes for birthdays and holding Sunday dinners, Brown said.

"She was always busy, she seemed to have a lot of energy," Jim Hosking said.

She retired from RCC in 1989. She enjoyed camping, fishing, sewing, cooking, volunteer work and traveling. She and her husband spent many of their retirement years camping with family and traveling around the world. Russell Hosking died 12 years ago.

Brown said her mother "always wanted to be involved in every conversation there ever was."

"When I think about the legacies passed down from the Smileys to my mom and then to us, I think of the importance of family and traditions and love and laughter, the high regard for education, concern for the environment and love of nature - the need to help others," Brown wrote in an e-mail. "She was the hub of the family and will be missed greatly."

She is survived by her four children; Jim Hosking, Janet Brown, Robert Hosking, and Dave Hosking, six grandchildren, and six great-grandchildren.

The family is planning services for a later date.