B. Smith

Barbara Elaine Smith was born on the twenty-fourth of August 1949 at Everson, Pennsylvania, the daughter of William H. Smith — an Everson Black steelworker — and Florence Smith, a part-time maid. She was raised in the principal Everson Black community of the principal post-Second-World-War Pennsylvania Black-steel-and-coal community.

She completed her secondary education at Scottdale High School at Scottdale, Pennsylvania in 1968 — and attended the Pittsburgh Pittsburgh Modeling Agency from 1968 to 1969.

She was hired in 1969 by the principal Wilhelmina Models at New York as a principal Black-and-mainstream-American fashion model — at the principal post-1969 American post-Naomi-Sims Black-fashion-model commercial period (Naomi Sims placed in this archive).

She was the principal first Black model on the cover of the principal Mademoiselle magazine in July 1976 — at the principal post-1976 mainstream-American Black-fashion-magazine cover period.

She relocated to New York in 1969 — and modelled across the principal 1970s and 1980s at the principal Wilhelmina Models commercial-fashion-modeling community.

She founded the principal B. Smith's Restaurant at the principal Restaurant Row at 47th Street at Manhattan in November 1986 — at the principal post-1986 Manhattan Restaurant Row Black-American-restaurateur commercial-restaurant community.

She expanded the principal B. Smith's Restaurant commercial enterprise across the principal post-1986 period — to the principal B. Smith's Restaurant at Sag Harbor, Long Island, New York in 1994 and the principal B. Smith's Restaurant at the principal Union Station at Washington, D.C. in 1998.

She hosted the principal nationally syndicated television show B. Smith with Style across the principal post-1997 American Black-and-mainstream lifestyle-media commercial period from 1997 to 2004.

She published the principal lifestyle-and-cookbook B. Smith's Entertaining and Cooking for Friends at the principal Artisan Press at New York in 1995 — and the principal B. Smith Cooks Southern-Style at the principal Scribner Press at New York in 2009.

She was the principal Black-American restaurateur-and-lifestyle media-figure of the principal post-1986 American Black-and-mainstream commercial-lifestyle-and-restaurant media period.

She was the principal post-2013 public-Alzheimer's-disease commercial-and-public-health communicator at the principal post-2013 Alzheimer's-Association Black-American-Alzheimer's-disease public-health-communication community.

She died at Sag Harbor, New York on the twenty-second of February 2020 of complications of early-onset Alzheimer's disease, at seventy.

She is honored here as the founder of B. Smith's Restaurant.