Fred Dumont Smith was born at Kewanee, Ill., Jan. 31, 1861, and was educated in the high school and National University of Washington, D. C. He was admitted to the bar of the District of Columbia in 1886 and immediately removed to Kinsley, Kan., and made his home there until December, 1908, when he removed to Hutchinson. He has been a practicing lawyer at the Kansas bar since 1886.

In 1900 he was elected state senator for the Thirty-eighth senatorial district and reëlected in 1904; was eight years chairman of the judiciary committee of that body. In 1904 he was a delegate at large to the National Republican convention at Chicago. In 1905 he made a tour of Europe, which he has since written up in the Kansas Magazine. In 1907, Mr. Smith made a tour of the Orient, including Japan, China and the Philippines and described his journey in "Blue Waters and Green," published by Crane & Company. In 1908 he published his second book, "The Book of a Hundred Bears," describing a trip through the Yellowstone Park. For the last two years he has been editor of the Kansas Magazine. In 1888 he married Florence Eustace, of Washington, D. C. They have one son, Eustace Smith, who was admitted to the bar in June, 1911, and is now in partnership with his father. His business is the law, his playground, literature.