JOHN DAY – Ron Smith is the newest face at Century 21 Franklin Realty. You might have seen him around town. He’s hard to miss. He’s a big man, well over 6 foot, with a smile almost as wide as his shoulders.

He and his wife, Diana, arrived in Grant County about a year ago. They bought a house through Franklin Realty, and Jerry Franklin, recognizing a friendly man when he meets one, asked Smith to consider selling real estate.

“I’d never done anything like that,” said Smith, who was a corrections officer in Multnomah County and a firefighter in Sandy for 27 years before he retired to Eastern Oregon in 2004. He’s a certified paramedic and the assistant fire chief for John Day.

He turned Franklin down at first, but the idea of selling real estate began to appeal to him.

“It’s an interesting concept,” Smith said. “I wanted to get to know the area, and it’s certainly a good way to do it. And I like the challenge of learning something new.”

So he started a self-study course from a company out of Bend – 150 hours of study, a state test and then a national test in order to be certified as a Realtor in Oregon.

He started working part-time for Franklin in July. He’s at the office most every day.

“I’ve met a lot of folks, that’s for sure, and I have no problem with the easier way of life. I like that people wave when they drive by,” Smith said.

Smith, born in 1944, grew up on a ranch in Bakersfield, Calif. He came to Oregon in 1971. He and Diana have been married for 42 years. They have two daughters, Alesa in Sandy, and Shannon in Hillsboro. Diana worked in the restaurant business, the last 12 as the manager of a Dairy Queen in Sandy.

He likes to hunt and fish, two of the things that made him consider coming to Grant County.

“Now that we’re retired, we’re supposed to travel,” Smith said. “Diana wants to drive through Wyoming, Montana. She wants to go east in the fall, but that would interfere with hunting season.”

They live in town now, but are looking to buy a place in the country. He grew up with horses, did some bull riding in rodeos, and he wants to have a place with mules and horses.

“I enjoy the fair here, and the rodeo,” he said. “You grow up with that, it never goes away.”

It was the outdoors that attracted him here, but it was small-town atmosphere, the people and the climate that convinced it was the place to be.

“It’s home,” he said. “I don’t think we’ll move anytime soon.”