Carleton Sprague Smith

Carleton Sprague Smith (8 August 1905, New York City — 19 September 1994, Washington, Connecticut) was an American musicologist and librarian who served as the chief of The New York Public Library's Music Division between 1931 and 1959. He was one of the founders and the president of the Music Library Association (1937–39) and the American Musicological Society (1939–40). Smith began playing flute at twelve, taking lessons in 1917 with Georges Barrère at the New York's Institute of Musical Art (future Juilliard School). After graduating from high school in 1922, Carleton went to Paris for a year to study French; he also took flute lessons with Louis Fleury. In 1923, Smith enrolled in Harvard University while further studying with Georges Laurent, the Boston Symphony Orchestra's principal flutist. Carleton graduated with his Bachelor's (1927) and Master's (1928) degrees and again traveled to Europe, acquiring his Ph.D. (1930) from the University of Vienna. In 1931, C.S. Smith returned to New York and began teaching history at Columbia University; the same year, he joined The New York Public Library. He taught music and history at the New York University between 1939 and 1967. Following his first Latin America tour in 1940 on behalf of the U.S. Department Of State and the American Council of Learned Societies, Smith became the chairman of performing arts at the Office of the Coordinator of Inter-American Affairs. He returned to South America several times, sponsored by Carnegie Corporation Of New York, among others, and lectured at Universidade De São Paulo, Fundação Escola de Sociologia e Política de São Paulo, and other institutions in Brazil. Smith was an adjunct professor at the New York University's Institute of Public Affairs and Regional Studies (1947 to 1958). In subsequent years, he held various research and advisory positions at educational and governmental institutions, including a Senior Research Associate at Yale University School Of Music.