Ag Smith

Smith resumed his playing career in 1919 with the Hamilton Tigers of the OHA Senior A League.^[5] In 1921, he and teammate Herb Rhéaume moved to Boston and joined the Westminster Hockey Club, an amateur team consisting of mostly Canadian players that captured the 1922 United States Amateur Hockey Association championship.^[6][7]

Smith joined the Boston Athletic Association ice hockey team in 1922 and was a member of the B.A.A. team that won the 1923 USAHA title.^[8][9] He served as the team's acting captain while Justin McCarthy was playing in the 1924 Winter Olympics.^[10] As Smith was not yet a U.S. citizen, he could not join his B.A.A. teammates on the Olympic squad.^[11] The B.A.A. dismissed all of the hockey players after the 1924–25 season due to rumors that they were receiving money.^[12]

During the 1926–27 season, Smith was captain of the Boston Tigers of the Canadian–American Hockey League, playing alongside former Hamilton stars George Redding, Fred Litzen, and Herb Rhéaume.^[13][14]

Smith refereed Eastern Amateur Hockey League games during the 1925–26 season.^[15] In 1930, he was elected vice-president of the New England Association of Hockey Officials.^[16] In 1932, he became a referee in the Canadian–American Hockey League.^[17] He was a top referee in the CAHL's successor organization – the American Hockey League.^[18]

Smith was a National Hockey League official from 1933 to 1946.^[19][20] He worked primarily as a linesman at the Boston Garden, as unlike referees, they didn't rotate between cities.^[20] He refereed games outside of Boston worked as a linesman in other cities during the playoffs. He officiated games during 1935, 1936, 1938, 1939, and 1940 Stanley Cup Finals.^{[21][22][23][24][25][26]}

Smith coached the amateur Boston Hockey Club during the 1931–32 season. On March 17, 1932, the club defeated the Fredericton Millionaires 8–6 in double overtime in what some observers believed to be a fixed game. As a result of the controversy, Smith resigned, five players (Winthrop Palmer, John Chase, John Garrison, Caswell McGregor, and Charles C. Cunningham) left the team, and the New England Amateur Referees' Association ordered its members not to referee any more games between the two teams.^[27]

Smith resided in Centerville, Massachusetts until 1941, when he moved to Quincy, Massachusetts. He died on October 12, 1972 at a nursing home after a long illness. He was survived by his wife, the former Helen M. Tagen, and seven of his siblings.^[11]