Samuel Harrison Smith (1772–1845) was born in Philadelphia and received an A.B. from the University of the State of Pennsylvania in 1787. He opened a printing business in Philadelphia in 1791 and published two comparatively short-lived periodicals before achieving success with the Universal Gazette in 1797. That same year his essay promoting free public schools, published as Remarks on Education (Philadelphia, 1798), won him an award from the American Philosophical Society and brought him to TJ’s attention. TJ appreciated Smith’s moderate Republicanism and in 1800 urged him to move the Gazette to Washington, D.C. Although the election was still in doubt, Smith complied and began the tri-weekly National Intelligencer and Washington Advertiser on 31 Oct. 1800, continuing the Universal Gazette as its weekly counterpart. For the duration of his presidency, the Intelligencer served as TJ’s journalistic spokesman, and Smith also benefited from lucrative government printing contracts. In September 1810 he sold the paper to Joseph Gales Jr. Smith accepted a position as commissioner of revenue in 1813, served briefly as secretary of the treasury in 1814, and was president successively of the Bank of Washington and the Washington branch of the Second Bank of the United States. He was also active in the American Colonization Society, the Washington City Library, and the Washington National Monument Society (ANB description begins John A. Garraty and Mark C. Carnes, eds., American National Biography, 1999, 24 vols. description ends ; DAB description begins Allen Johnson and Dumas Malone, eds., Dictionary of American Biography, 1928–36, 20 vols. description ends ; Brigham, American Newspapers description begins Clarence S. Brigham, History and Bibliography of American Newspapers, 1690–1820, 1947, 2 vols. description ends , 1:103–4, 106–7, 2:927, 960; William E. Ames, A History of the National Intelligencer [1972]).