Topic starter
04/03/2007 11:59 pm
It is yet another sad posting, this time to announce that Capt. Norman Hillman died March 1 in Auburndale, Florida. Services were held Saturday March 3rd. Capt. Hillman had been in failing health for a while. If anyone would like the address to send a note to his widow Raynell, please email me. Capt. Hillman worked on towboats for most of his career, piloted the DELTA QUEEN and MISSISSIPPI QUEEN, and ended up piloting the PRESIDENT in her first days here as a gambling boat. Capt. Hillman was pilot on the ALEXANDER MACKENZIE, and was one, if not the last, of the last pilots to bring a boat through the Hennepin Canal. He chronicled his life's work in his autobiography, One Man and the Mighty Mississippi, which is available on Amazon.. Here is a picture taken aboard the PRESIDENT in 1990 with his wife Raynell and Capt. Joy Manthey flanking Capt. Norman in the pilothouse.
05/03/2007 12:41 am
Very sad news, indeed. We loved our time with Norman and Raynell on the DQ. One particularly memorable trip we shared with the captain and his bride was their "honeymoon" trip -- the first time (and hopefully only time) the DQ went up the Missouri River to St. Charles. What a great guy he was, what a loving couple of newlyweds they were, even after they had been married for quite a while -- and they sure did love to dance. I hate to break the news of this to my mother. She has always been enormously fond of Capt. Norman.
05/03/2007 12:49 am
Terrible news...
He was a good friend of my family....My Grandpa Zahn is mentioned in his book, so are my parents & me (although not in name)...
When I'd go along (Mom & Dad too) with Grandpa Zahn on one of his back-to-back DQ trips...the Hillmans were always our tablemates in the Orleans Room...we had the pleasure to know his 1st wife who had died (who could have been a younger sister to my Grandmother Zahn, both in looks & personality), and his second wife as well.
Judy is right...he was the last to pilot a commercial vessel through the Hennepin Canal. He also was a master of the Illinois River, getting his start around 1936.
Very sad...but I am glad and thankful to God he is at peace....
http://www.steamboats.org/talkshop/messages/9602.html
05/03/2007 2:27 am
I am saddened by the passing of Captain Hillman.I had the privilege of being a passenger on the Delta Queen when Captain Hillman was piloting and his wife Raynell was on board with him. In addition, Captain Hillman and Bobby Powell were partners in piloting the American Queen on its maiden voyage from Pittsburgh to St Louis in 1995.
05/03/2007 4:21 pm
I was asked to post the address of Capt. Hillman´s wife
Raynell Hillman
P.O. Box 784
Auburndale, FL 33823
Carmen
10/03/2007 12:46 pm
This is from the 1980's, it is not dated...but my Grandfather Zahn's last DQ trip was in 1989, so it must be before then!
Oh, pictured are Captain Norman Hillman & my maternal grandfather Russell V. Zahn...