Sidney Wilson Smith

September 17, 1955 - November 29, 2015

Sidney Wilson Smith died November 29 at age 60 at his childhood Central Gardens District home, first occupied by his grandparents Sidney and Lucy Genette, at 1521 Linden Ave. Wilson spent his early years in Memphis, where he lived with his mother Virginia Genette Smith and grandparents. There he attended Idlewild elementary school and briefly Memphis University School before moving to New York City to live with his father, R. Leigh Smith Jr., and step-mother Miraed Peake Smith. He attended Trinity, Choate and Dwight schools and studied math at Columbia University. He worked in accounting at Al-Mac trucking in New York and then shifted into technology and computers at Time Inc. at a time when desktop users sometimes had to wage guerrilla war against the mainframe-dominated IT department. He worked remotely in Austin, Texas for Time before leaving just before the AOL merger in 2000. Then he moved back to Memphis to live at Linden Avenue after his grandparents died. There he worked in technology with stints at Memphis Light Gas and Water and more recently St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital. He is survived by his life partner Cathy Ross and older brother Randy Smith of New York City, along with two nephews Will and Jack, his aunt Jane Twist and four first cousins Sidney Genette, Jane Slatery, Lucy McDougall and Madeline Genette. A memorial service will be held at Canale Funeral Directors, 2700 Union Avenue Extended, at 11 a.m. on Wednesday December 9, preceded by a visitation period there beginning at 10 a.m.