About
Book author, newspaper columnist and dedicated gardener, Bob Hill has authored 14 books, written more than 4,000 newspaper columns and traveled the world seeking the best plants for his eight-acre slice of horticultural heaven in Southern Indiana just north of Louisville, Kentucky.
It all took some time – like 60 years. It was an award-winning journalism career that began writing in long hand with a Ticonderoga pencil, a book-author journey that included writing on the history of the Louisville Slugger bat, a look at bi-polar illness and a nationally televised story of a Louisville man who got away with murder.
Gardening began with growing tomatoes and potatoes in a Northern Illinois cornfield and ended up touring some of the finest gardens in Europe and Northern Ireland.
Bob Hill was born in Paterson, N.J. on Nov. 21, 1942, the son of Robert and Elizabeth Hill. One of five children, he attended elementary school in Singac and Little Falls New Jersey until the family moved to Sycamore in Northern Illinois in 1951.
He attended Sycamore (Illinois) High School, graduating in 1960. Played football, basketball, baseball and ran track. Was offered football scholarships from Northwestern and the University of Iowa. Attended Rice University in Houston Texas in 1960 on a basketball scholarship. Married Janet Hill, high school sweetheart, between his sophomore and junior year at Rice on August 25, 1962. Received a Bachelor of Commerce degree in 1964.
Briefly worked for Montgomery Ward in Houston suburb, then moved back to Illinois for a production control job at a newly opened Chrysler Corporation assembly plant in Belvidere where their daughter. Jennifer, was born on Sept. 26, 1966.
Wanting to get into journalism, Bob was hired as editor of his home-town bi-weekly newspapers – the Sycamore Sun Tribune and True Republican – where he quickly gravitated to column writing. Their son, Robb Hill, was born there Feb. 28, 1969.
After two years in Sycamore he moved on to the Rockford Morning Star in Rockford Illinois where he became a police reporter, feature writer and three-times-a-week columnist. In June 1975, Bob was hired by the Louisville Times where he again worked as a reporter, feature writer and eventually a columnist for the late-great SCENE Magazine. In the late 1970s Bob switched over to the Courier-Journal as its Kentucky columnist for two years..
He returned to the Louisville Times in the early 1980s, eventually writing three columns a week, feature stories and a garden column. He also worked for several years for the Sunday Magazine.
In all, Bob worked 33 years for the Louisville Times and Courier Journal writing more than 4,000 columns and news and feature stories and winning many local, state and national writing awards. All of his work has been preserved at the Filson Historical Society.
Soon after retiring from the Courier-Journal in 2008 he was hired by David and Dan Jones to write stories about the people and land along Floyds Fork in preparation for their creating a 4,000-acre Parklands of Floyds Fork along the river. That would lead to Bob working with David A. Jones on his biography.
In all Bob would write or help with 14 books on various subjects from basketball to murder to the Belle of Louisville to gardening. His latest, released in October 2023, was helping Louisville’s David Jones write “Always Moving Forward,” the story of his life and the creation of the Humana Corporation.
