D. D. Smalley
(1889-1963)
David David Smalley was a mapmaker for the Southern Pacific Railroad. He lived in Hyde Park, a small neighborhood near downtown Houston. Smalley was the keeper of a neighborhood museum in his attic, the Hyde Park Miniature Museum. This was a museum named such not because of its collection of miniature things (though those were there, as well) but for the “miniature” size of the attic itself. Smalley’s curiosities, however, were limitless. The attic included a jar of pencils so short the eraser sat on top of the point, a seed from a cucumber tree in Washington, D.C., and a large telescope lens that Smalley ground himself. No object in the collection was hands-off, and as exhibits were damaged and deteriorated, Smalley would fix and maintain them. During the weekend, neighborhood children counted out stamps steamed from his mail and tied them with string in bundles of fifty and then carefully stacked the bundles into empty cigar boxes. The collection was temporarily revived twice after Smalley’s death, by his grandson Frank Davis. Today it rests in boxes, in storage, collecting dust.
