H. C. Smart

Smart was educated at Sydney High School and on leaving was employed as a journalist.

He fought in the South African wars.

Sometime before 1911 he was appointed director of the Publicity Department, Australia House, London.{{cite news |url=https://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article263762649 |title=Commonwealth of Australia |newspaper=Australian Town and Country Journal |volume=LXXXI |issue=2154 |location=New South Wales, Australia |date=17 May 1911 |access-date=7 June 2023 |page=22 |via=National Library of Australia}}

In January 1916 he was contacted by C. E. W. Bean, who was having trouble securing a publisher for his magazine, The Anzac Book, an illustrated history of the Gallipoli campaign from the landing to the evacuation. By 15 February they had signed up with Cassell and Company and had a final press-ready proof in their hands. There was a problem with war-time supplies of paper, and the first copies rolled of the press in May.{{cite thesis|title=Painting Anzac : A history of Australia’s official war art scheme of the First World War |author=Michael Scheib |url=https://ses.library.usyd.edu.au/bitstream/handle/2123/13139/scheib_mg_thesis_1%20pdf.pdf?sequence=2&isAllowed=y |publisher=The University of Sydney |access-date=7 June 2023}}

Bean and Smart worked closely together thereafter, discussing plans for a national gallery, war memorial, developing the Australian War Records Section, (for which Smart selected the artists (Fred Leist and H. Septimus Power were the first) and supplied their materials), and much else.

In 1921 he was appointed Deputy Director of Migration, with offices in Australia House.{{cite news |url=https://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article121919595 |title=Migration Offices |newspaper=Queensland Times |volume=LXII |issue=10,921 |location=Queensland, Australia |date=3 March 1921 |access-date=7 June 2023 |page=5 |via=National Library of Australia}}

He was an organiser of the Wembley Exhibition of 1925, for which service he was awarded the CBE.{{cite news |url=https://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article29127403 |title=Wembley Honours |newspaper=The Mercury |volume=CXXIV |issue=18,168 |location=Tasmania, Australia |date=21 January 1926 |access-date=7 June 2023 |page=7 |via=National Library of Australia}}

He directed the Australian pavilion at the 1938 Exhibition in Glasgow.{{cite news |url=https://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article184110201 |title=Australia Outstanding at Glasgow Exhibition |newspaper=The Telegraph (Brisbane) |location=Queensland, Australia |date=29 October 1938 |access-date=7 June 2023 |page=13 |via=National Library of Australia}}

He was a supporter of Australian art, and in 1951 garnered support for an exhibition of Australian works to be held in London.{{cite news |url=https://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article18193764 |title=Academy Show Discussions |newspaper=The Sydney Morning Herald |issue=35,268 |location=New South Wales, Australia |date=3 January 1951 |access-date=7 June 2023 |page=5 |via=National Library of Australia}}

He married an English girl, Daisy Hope Foster, and settled in England. Their children included

• Hope Foster "Patsy" Smart (10 September 1918 – 6 February 1996), actress, married John Warrington in 1945
• Ralph Foster Smart (27 August 1908 – 12 February 2001), director of Bush Christmas and Bitter Springs{{cite news |url=https://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article28665759 |title=Those Bitter Springs |newspaper=The Sunday Herald (Sydney) |issue=44 |location=New South Wales, Australia |date=20 November 1949 |accessdate=7 June 2023 |page=4 (Features) |via=National Library of Australia}}

It is not known whether Smart ever paid a return visit to Australia.

He died in a nursing home in Maidenhead, aged 72.{{cite news |url=https://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article18212038 |title=H. C. Smart Dies |newspaper=The Sydney Morning Herald |issue=35,429 |location=New South Wales, Australia |date=11 July 1951 |access-date=7 June 2023 |page=3 |via=National Library of Australia}}

• Smart he was awarded the CBE in 1926.
• Smart Place, in the Canberra suburb of Evatt, was named for him.{{cite news |url=https://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article240711962 |title=Australian Capital Territory National Memorials Ordinance 1928–1972 |newspaper=Australian Government Gazette. General |issue=34 |location=Australia, Australia |date=23 April 1974 |access-date=7 June 2023 |page=14 |via=National Library of Australia}}

• Smart, H. C. Australia in the great war; the story told in pictures 1918
• Smart, H. C. (ed.) What Australia Has Done 1944

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Category:1878 births

Category:1951 deaths

Category:People educated at Sydney Boys High School

Category:Australian journalists

Category:Australian propagandists

Category:Australian event planners

Category:Australian Commanders of the Order of the British Empire