Life After
Reinhardt
By Jenna Bednarsky
All photographs provided by Chris Smith.
In the spring of 2014, Chris “Chunk“ Smith walked across the stage and received his diploma from the President of Reinhardt University. Chin up, grinning ear-to-ear, family shouting—he had done it. I don’t think anyone knew at that time that they were watching one of Reinhardt’s most memo-rable students leave its campus.
I first met Chris Smith when we took a night class together: Creative Writing with Professor Harlow. The red-headed, freckle-faced senior always showed up fifteen minutes late to class covered in red dirt stains and sweat. We didn’t speak much until that one day when he shared a story about his father.
His voice shook after Harlow coaxed him into finally sharing, saying it was one of the
best pieces she had read.
Walking down the stairwell in Lawson afterward, I asked him more about his father, his major, and the nickname he went by—“Chunk.” He said it had always been his baseball name and that his brother had one to match. By that next spring semester, he was plopping down a bag of Twizzlers onto the library balcony railing, giving me relationship advice, and trying to convince me to stay in college.
Chunk Smith came to Reinhardt after hav-ing spent time at Savannah State, preferring the small, private-school feel that Reinhardt had to offer in comparison. He spent most of his time on campus on the Ken White Baseball Field. He hit home runs both on
Chunk at one of his last baseball games at Reinhardt.
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