Josué Smith Solar was born in San Nicolás, Chile,[1] son of American engineer Silas Baldwin Smith and Chilean citizen Leonor Solar Ojeda.
[2][3] Smith Solar studied in Chillán and at the Colegio de los Sagrados Corazones of Santiago.
In 1885, he began to study architecture at the Polytechnic College of Pennsylvania, United States.
In 1889 he traveled to Europe and returned to the United States in 1891, where he opened an architectural firm in Wilmington, Delaware.
In 1894 he moved with his wife Cecilia Celestine Miller to Chile, and they ultimately settled there.