He served as the head football coach at the United States Military Academy from 1906 to 1907, compiling a record of 7–2–1.

He attended schools in Burlington, Iowa, and graduated from West Point in 1897.

During World War I, he served as an adjutant to Peyton C. March, the Chief of Staff of the United States Army.

Smither died on July 13, 1930, at the Olney sanitarium in Lawrenceville, Illinois, following two operations for appendicitis.

This biographical article relating to a college football coach first appointed in the 1900s is a stub.