• Birth: 19 JAN 1874 in Kankakee, Illinois
• Death: 30 DEC 1955 in Palo Alto, Santa Clara, California

  
  Father: Ellsworth Jerome HILL b: 1 DEC 1833 in Le Roy, Genesee, New York
  Mother: Milancie LEACH b: 16 NOV 1836 in Dansville, Livingston, New York
  
  Marriage 1 Clara SCOTT b: 25 OCT 1871 in Lagrange, Lagrange, Indiana

  • Married: 7 AUG 1901 in Vicksbug, Michigan

Children: Scott and Margaret

Scott wrote in a letter dated 13th May 1989:

"Albert E. Hill, my father (1874- 1955) was born in Kankakee. In 1888 the family moved to Chicago where he attended high school. To earn money for college he worked in the Chicago stock yards as an accountant--a part of his life he did not care to dwell on. 

He graduated from the Univ. of Chicago and took enough graduate work for a PhD but never wrote the dissertation---he saw no point in it since he had done the work and knew the subject well. Later in life as a professor he always was careful to correct people who introduced him as doctor. After leaving the university he entered public school work, became superintendent of schools at Lake Forest, Ill. , and there met Mother who had come down from Michigan to teach in the same schools, having taken her degree at Ann Arbor.

Around 1903 or 04 father accepted appointment to the faculty at the Univ. of Chicago under Manly, and the family moved over near his parents just off 72 nd St, and not far from the elevated with connections to the university. Margaret, my sister, was born there in 1906.

 A few years later we moved nearer the university, and eventually to 6023 Lexington Ave (later changed to University Ave) just back of Woodlawn and now all taken over by the Law School. By 1912 fatherr, had decided that Margaret and I should not grow up in Chicago, so in 1913 he took a position as professor of English at the University of Nevada, where he stayed until his retirement in 1946. 

By then he was head of the English Dept.,.and one of the best liked professors at the university. Although he took his share of freshman English courses, his great interests included teaching Shakespeare, Chaucer, poetry, and perhaps best of all, the Bible. Many returning students sought him out to tell him what encouragement they had had from him in starting their literary or journalism careers. 

One of his favorite students was Walter Van Tilburg Clark whose first successful book was The Ox-Bow Incident. On the flyleaf of the presentation. copy which I took from father's library I find this; "To A.E. --affectionately-and in the hope he will find it enough better going to repay a little on his early endurance."  In his early years Walter (he died about 1970) was always writing father, getting suggestions and encouragement.

Father began work in the summer of 1913 at Reno, and the rest of the family together with Florence Scott moved out a few months later. Here we went thru the adjustmento to the great West, a happy experience by and large with introductions to living among mountains, hiking trips into them, and camping, and some of the hazzards of such things. 

Although a teaching salary was very meager even tho he supplemented it with the dreaded "summer session" which he hated (I was never sure whether it was the students, the weather, or his desire to be free that upset him) but it did give the little extra margin so the family could do things. 

So in 1914 we spent part of the summer in Ari tead Mont., with three weeks in Yellowstone with horse drawn teams,. shot the Salmon River in Idaho in a\flat bottomed boat steered by sweeps from a platform in the middle, with an old river man guiding it thru the very dangerous rapids between the cliffs and had a taste of ranching thru the Decker and Scott families. 

The next year, 1915, we spent a month in San Francisco near the ocean and Cliff House, and attended the S.F. World's Fair every other day---which probably fixed my mind on engineering as a career. The second month was at San Diego, sdhere the other great exposition was held at Balboa Park. (Panama Pacific Expo.)

Then came the war years, 1917-1918. The great influenza epidemic swept the country, including Reno. It almost took off ffthv and Margaret. It was in the winter and they were moved into down airs rooms at our home, 343 Maple St. (now taken by a superhighWay) where Mother nursed them night and day with some help from me and we pulled them thru, but it was very close. Both father and I worked on the land summers in these years, he on a ranch in Antelope Valley and I near Reno, to "help" the war effort. I entered the Univ. of Nevada in 1919 when I was just under 17, and graduated with a BS in Electrical Engineering in 1923. Incidentally our first car was a Dodge, 1921, and with it we visited Yosemite, Tahoe, Lassen, Crater Lake, the Columbia River country, and of course the desert areas such as Pyramid Lake and Virginia City.

Father was not a joiner but concentrated on books, his interest in his garden and especially flowers, and people. There were many erudite dinner parties with the interesting faculty people and towns folk, and the conversation was fascinating. It ranged over politics (Wilson was in), literature, history, and the future of Nevada as a state. Mother was an excellent hostess.

Father and Mother made several automobile trips across the country while still living in Reno. The first was about 1929, and they drove the air cooled Franklin car they owned. Then about 1937 they had both the only luxury Father ever craved, a practically new Cadillac car (which by 1970's standards would more nearly resemble a truck in every way), and they drove east by way of Florida, toured some of New England, and returned by way of the Canadian Rockies. It was their last big trip. Father had a tendency to heart difficulty, the 4500 foot altitude at Reno bothered him especially when they drove up to higher elevations, so they moved to Palo Alto to a house Jim Stedman had built and which backed up to Margaret's and Jim's home (2323 Webster).

The last years were on the whole very pleasant ones with. enough friends around for company. Father could read without glasses, and he read a great deal. Mother had begun to lope her eyesight (and hearing) , so father read to her a great deal in spite of the fact that.she had learned Braille 1, and had gone on to Braille 2. 

The patio in the sun, the garden and fruit trees, and the generally mild climate coupled with being near Margaret and their three children made life very pleasant. Father's heart problems grew worse and he had to give up his favorite Cadillac, but he still' took great interest in national and international affairs t4nd had good judgement concerning them as well as an eye for the foibles of politics. He also had the stock market as a daily interest and many of the things into which he put small amounts of money grew substantially in the years from the 1930's to the 1950's---it being a favorable time. 

Father died in December 1955, and "other became very disspirited and died the following September. They had a happy life together and in terms of real values a very productive one. Father was rather calm and unhurried, a philosopher or contemplative type, and had a good deal of the character of Mr. Chips, in Goodbye Kr. Chips.

Children:

Margaret Hill

Scott Hill