Merle J. Hill, who worked nearly four decades in the La Crosse Tribune newsroom, died Saturday, Dec. 26, at Tomah Memorial Hospital. He was 102.
Hill was born Dec. 22, 1918, on the family farm near Tomah to Caddie and Emma (Zastoupil) Hill. He graduated from Tomah High School in 1936 and earned his journalism degree from Marquette University in 1940.
He enlisted in the U.S. Army in January 1941 and rose to the rank of staff sergeant. He served in New Guinea and the Philippines during World War II, alongside his future wife, Lt. Anne Daley.
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After the war Hill married Daly, his “favorite officer,” in August 1946 in Chicago. Together they had six children, four grandchildren and several great-grandchildren.
As Hill and his wife settled in La Crosse, he took a job in 1946 as a reporter for the Tribune. After two years as a reporter, Hill became the newspaper’s wire editor, a role he held for the next 35 years.
