BLACK
HISTORY
February 8, 2017
Obituary
In Loving Memory
James Edward Hill
A celebration of life gathering
for James Edward Hill, a promi-
nent member of the civil rights
community in both Portland and
Washington, D.C., will take place
Saturday, Feb. 11 at 11 a.m. in the
Water and Gibbs neighborhood of
southwest Portland. Participants
will meet at 018 S.W. Grover St.
and take a short tour of the neigh-
borhood with a stop at the histor-
ic Hill family home at 3322 S.W.
Water St.
James Edward Hill died Jan.
8, 2017. He was born in Birming-
ham, Ala. on June 26, 1938 to
James Hill and Willie Lee Eason.
During the Great Migration his
parents moved to Portland so that
his father could work in the port
industry to create a better life for
his family.
James was a longtime activist,
beginning with his participation
in the Student Nonviolent Coor-
dinating Committee in Helena,
Ark., and followed by his work
for the anti-war and Black Power
movements of the 1960s through
the Free South Africa movement
in the 1990s.
He had a variety of interests
and talents over his lifetime. Be-
fore losing his sight, he practiced
video documentation, photog-
raphy, graphic art design, and
stage production. He was an early
computer user and experimented
with a variety of software in the
80s. He loved fishing, rock col-
lecting, maintaining an exotic fish
tank, bird watching, and keeping
up with the latest technology for
playing music. He was a live-con-
cert regular of most genres of pop-
ular music and lovingly involved
his daughter Gloria in all of these
extra-curricular activities.
In 1966, as a student at the
University of Oregon he was a
founding member of the Black
Student Union. After a protest in
the U of O President’s Office, he
was part of a team of activists that
negotiated university support for
funding Project 75, an initiative
that brought 75 African-American
students to the campus to pursue
undergraduate studies. A year lat-
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er he was part of a black student
led group that negotiated bringing
50 Latino students to the universi-
ty as freshman.
He was one of the first leaders
to work with the university to ad-
vocate for the release of women
prisoners of non-violent crimes
to enroll at Oregon; and was ar-
chitect of the “Doing it Black”
Program, a strategy for bringing
diversity to Eugene and the re-
gion. He regularly worked with
students to develop their talents in
song, dance, instrumentation, spo-
ken word and acting.
James earned his Bachelor of
Science degree at Oregon in 1969
and a Masters degree in education
and counseling in 1970, also at the
U of O.
He was the director of Up-
ward Bound at Oregon and later
the director of Upward Bound at
Macalester College in St. Paul,
Minn., where he continued his ef-
forts to empower students. When
the family moved to Washington,
D.C. in 1974, he worked for a time
at the University of Maryland as
an administrator before health
challenges required him to retire
on disability.
James leaves behind his wife of
49 years, Sylvia Hill; his daughter
Gloria Pearson; a granddaughter,
Carmen Pearson; brothers O.B.
Hill of Portland and Michael Hill
of Washington, D.C., and many
nieces and nephews as well as
grand-nieces and nephews.
503-288-0033
Page 17
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