Smith, Thomas P.

Thomas P. Smith, born in Jacksonville, Floyd County, Virginia, on February 27, 1871, was a prominent business man and civic leader in Coalinga, California. He was raised on a farm by his parents, Jacob and Jane Nixon Smith, but turned to commercial work after an injury forced him to abandon agriculture. At age nineteen, he began clerking in West Virginia before gradually migrating westward and arriving in Hanford, California, in 1896. Moving to Coalinga in February 1903, he established the city’s first exclusive men’s furnishing store on Fifth Street. Originally operating alongside his brother A. W. Smith as Smith Brothers, Thomas later bought out his partner in 1914 and eventually expanded into a new brick store building to accommodate his growing business.

Beyond his retail success in Coalinga, Thomas P. Smith partnered with his brother A. B. Smith to build a store and operate a men’s clothing business named Smith Brothers, Inc., in Taft, California. He was deeply active in public service, serving as a city trustee for two and a half years while holding the position of board chairman throughout his term. Between April 1911 and 1917, he served as a trustee for the Coalinga Union High School and acted as secretary for the library board. In this leadership role, he was instrumental in securing the Carnegie Fund and constructing the Union High School District Library building. He married Bessie M. Wescott in 1904, and together they raised three children named Ernest, Mildred, and Mabel.