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Bluffton native Charles R. Hilty, 85, died on May 30, 2020, of complications of COVID-19. He had a career as a newspaper editor and as a senior government administrator in both the legislative and executive branches of the federal government.
He was born Nov. 6, 1934, in Bluffton, Ohio, to Charles and Della (Kempf) Hilty. A 1952 Bluffton High School graduate, he attended Ohio Wesyleyan University and graduated from Bowling Green State University in 1960. From 1956 to 1967 he was associate editor and then editor of the Bluffton News, working with Milton Edwards and Eugene Benroth. During this era, the News won 15 state and six national honors.
Hilty served in the Ohio National Guard from 1960 to 1966. In 1967, he and his wife Carole K. Dirks Hilty, moved to Bloomington, Illinois, where he became the editor of the Bloomington Pantagraph. Then from 1973 to 1978 he was night editor of the St. Louis Post-Dispatch.
In 1978, he became chief of staff for U.S. Congressman Ed Madigan. From 1984 to 1991, he served as minority staff director for the House Committee on Agriculture.
After President George H.W. Bush appointed Madigan as Secretary of Agriculture in 1991, Hilty was appointed Assistant Secretary of Agriculture for Administration and served as such for the balance of Bush’s term. One of his roles in that capacity was to be the chief financial officer of the second largest department of the federal government.
He had served as president of the Bluffton Public Library Board and the Northwest Ohio Newspaper Association, a member of the Society for American Baseball Research, the Historical Society of the District of Columbia and the governing body of the Foundry United Methodist Church, and board chair of the Arneson Institute of Practical Politics at Ohio Wesleyan University.
He was 50-plus year member of the Bluffton Lodge 432, F & A.M. where he had served as a lodge officer.
He is survived by a cousin, Sue Groves of Lima; brother-in-law Marvin J. Dirks, Jr., and sister-in-law Ruthann Cochran Dirks, and brother-in-law Stanley J. Dirks, and by nieces: Rachel Dirks, Danielle Crisman, Erin Mathes and Emily Garvie, and their children.
Contributions in his memory may be made to Foundry United Methodist Church, Washington, D.C., or to Bluffton University, for the Carole K. Hilty Scholarship Fund.
