A young Jerry Smith (1946).

"I first met Jerry Smith in the late `80's when I began as Senior Vice-President of Production for Hanna-Barbera Cartoons. Jerry was running Fil-Cartoons at the time and we immediately hit it off. Jerry was a real pro. He could tell you the exact situation, what the problems were, where they were, how to solve them and how long it would take. There were no politics, no games, just answers with Jerry. He would always deliver by finding resourceful ways to solve problems. Sometimes in Manila there will be power outs, so Jerry hooked up a diesel generator so the studio would always have power and he is famous for using the motors from normal household drills to use in automating animation cameras!

Jerry was special because he didn't forget his roots. He started as a cameraman and even when he was running the entire studio if a deadline was in jeopardy he would roll up his sleeves and shoot until midnight to get the show got done. Then he'd go home for a few hours, take a shower and show back up at the studio a few hours later. That to me is a true professional. As you grow you tend to forget about the people in the trenches and Jerry never did that. That's what Jerry Smith stands for in this business."

-Paul Sabella
Executive Producer, MGM Animation

"Jerry Smith. I called him a 'humanoid' upon witnessing a night of filming one of my shorts--all 98 scenes shot with the precision of a Swiss watch, rolling his chair from a stack of cels to camera -click!- back to cels, to camera, -click!- back to cels It was like watching a fine choreography of a ballet. And he did all of that without a single mistake! I hope God puts him to good use within the chaos of the Universe."

-Marija Miletic-Dail
Producer/Director, Universal Cartoon Studios