Elwood Fayette Hill
February 18, 1939
Elwood Fayette Hill, born February 18, 1939, to Dorthella Nevada Annett and Charles Elwood Hill in Tonopah, Nevada, spent his formative years in small Nevada towns of Silver Peak, Babbitt, and Yerington. Though a bit of a loner, Elwood was comfortable wandering in nature and preferred individual sports such as track and field, where he was one of Nevada’s best sprinters in 1956 and 1957. After graduation from Yerington High, his interests led him to San Jose State (BA, Biology) and summer employment with the Nevada Fish and Game Commission (Nevada Department of Wildlife, NDOW). These summers with mentors such as Ted Frantz and Nick Papez were valuable preparation for a career in wildlife biology.
Following college and military in California, Elwood returned to Nevada for employment with the NDOW as an all-purpose biologist/game warden for
Lincoln and Nye Counties. After a few years he found a new calling with the “environmental movement” of the 1960’s and opted for a research assignment in Florida with the National Communicable Disease Center (CDC) to study exposure of wild animals to large-scale application of mosquito control chemicals (e.g., DDT and malathion). This was a radical change for a young family to move several thousand miles from rural Nevada at about 6,000 feet and low humidity to metropolitan south Florida near sea level and extreme humidity.
After three years of laboratory and field research with the CDC, Hill transferred to the United States (U.S.) Department of the Interior’s Patuxent Wildlife Research Center in Maryland to expand his research to include pesticides and industrial chemicals and complete his education at the University of Maryland, College Park (PhD, Toxicology). Additional to his personal research, Hill led an interdisciplinary team of Patuxent scientists in studies of pollution-wildlife interactions across the U.S. and served as Professor of Toxicology at the Universities of Maryland, College Park, and Baltimore.
During more than a half-century of research, Dr. Hill published in peer reviewed journals, served as expert witness for the U.S. Department of Justice, and assisted state and federal scientists in interpretation of chemical hazards to wildlife. In the early 1970’s, Dr. Hill and colleagues at Patuxent assisted the fledgling U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) in development of wildlife testing protocols for regulatory purposes. Thereafter, Dr. Hill regularly served as scientific adviser to the EPA on pesticide toxicology.
Elwood was active in professional organizations such as The Wildlife Society, Wildlife Disease Association, Sigma Xi, and the Society of Toxicology, and was a founding member of the Society of Environmental Toxicology and Chemistry (SETAC). Hill Also served nearly a decade as a Medical Service Corps officer in the U.S. Army Reserve.
In 1995, Hill returned to northern Nevada to “return to home and family” and continue this research on environmental contamination with a focus on historic mining effluent in the Carson River from the Comstock Lode. Of interest, his great-grandfather was a hard rock miner on the Comstock and certainly never imagined his descendant would be studying his handiwork as it may affect a natural waterway.
Once in Nevada, Elwood finally broadened his interests beyond science to include European history. Thus, hiking in Europe and museums were at the top of the list. A highlight of his European travels was to visit the Charles Darwin Estate near London – Darwin was way ahead of his time! Hill’s biggest disappointment: Divisiveness in American politics – so much needed, so little accomplished! How can so much progress be undone so quickly post 2016? And in the words of Hill’s undergraduate mentor, Dr. William Graf, “Never compromise your professional integrity for political expediency!”
Elwood was predeceased by his parents, sister Katherine Ann (Hill) Laxalt, and spouse Vicki Ann (Rebrook) Hill. He is survived by his daughters, Margo Maria Parkin (grandsons Daniel Parkin and David Parkin) and Maureen Katherine Hill (granddaughter Holly Summers, Ph.D., and her spouse, Jeremy Summers, and great-granddaughters Hailey Summers and Cadence Summers), and his son, Michael Francis Hill, R.N.
As requested by Elwood, there will be no service. He always had a little trouble dealing with uncertainties.