Southern Literary Studies

C. Alphonso Smith (1864 - 1924) was an American Professor of English, college dean, philologist and folklorist. Smith was appointed Professor of English at Louisiana State University, where he taught from 1893-1902. He moved to the University of North Carolina in 1902 as head of its English department and was appointed the first dean of its graduate school in 1903. He founded and edited the journal Studies in Philology. From 1909 to 1917 he taught at the University of Virginia, where he was appointed the first Edgar Allan Poe Professor of English. He was temporarily away from that position from 1910-11, while he served as Theodore Roosevelt Exchange Professor at the University of Berlin. Finally, in 1917 he became Head of the English Department at the United States Naval Academy.