James R. Hill

James Russell Hill of Weymouth, MA died at Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston, MA on March 23, 2022 at the age of 68 after a twenty-month battle with squamous cell carcinoma.  James was known as “Jim” to friends and “Russell” to family.

Jim was born in Maryville, TN, on July 17, 1953.  He lived with his parents, James Garland Hill and Betty Sue (née Collins) Hill, and his sister, Dana Sue Hill, in Calderwood, TN, Jacksonville, FL, Marietta, GA, and Los Alamitos, CA until moving to Weymouth, MA in 1966, on account of his father’s assignments to United States Naval Air Stations in all but Calderwood. Jim graduated from Weymouth High School in 1971, and attended Northeastern University before transferring to the University of Massachusetts Boston in 1974.  At UMass Boston, he completed a bachelor’s degree in mathematics in 1988, a master’s degree in computer science in 1998, and was also a Ph.D. candidate in computer science.

From 1978 to 1987, Jim was employed as a software engineer and programmer at Input Output Computer Services (IOCS), becoming a director and a program manager.  From 1987 to 2000, he was a general manager and corporate officer at System Resources Corporation (SRC), rising to the position of company vice president, and was then employed as company vice president at Oasis Systems, Inc. from 2000 to 2001.  From 2001 to 2016, Jim was the Air Traffic Management Systems Division Chief at the John A. Volpe National Transportation Systems Center in Cambridge, MA.  From 2017 until his cancer treatment, Jim was the chief engineer at NIRA, Inc., and was also an adjunct faculty member of Brandeis University in 2000 and Quincy College in 2016.

Jim was an avid cyclist, hiker, and table tennis player, and also enjoyed skiing, golfing, sailing, and fishing.  He left behind a sizable collection of coins, as well as books and movies (particularly science fiction and fantasy).  He was a longtime New England Patriots season ticket holder, and also attended many Boston Celtics and Boston Red Sox games over the decades (after growing up loving the Los Angeles Dodgers in the Sandy Koufax era).  While raised as a Southern Baptist, Jim later converted to Unitarian Universalism.  In his lifetime, Jim traveled to China, India, South Africa, Germany, Chile, Argentina, and Mexico, and enjoyed trying the cuisines of different cultures.

However, due to having lived in many different places during his childhood, and despite having lived in the Greater Boston area for most of his life, Jim always felt most at home in Graham County, North Carolina where his mother’s family has lived for centuries.  Towards the end of his life, he helped to organize family reunions among the descendants of his mother’s parents (Edward and Bessie Collins), and imparted upon his children the intention of continuing to attend them. Jim is survived by his daughter, Anna Natasha Hill Cameron (husband of Joshua David Cameron) of Newton, and his son, James Austin Hill of Weymouth, and was the former husband of Natalie Ann Johnson of Weymouth.

Relatives and friends are respectfully invited to greet the family during the visiting hours, on Saturday, April 23rd, from 10 AM to 11 AM, in the McDonald Keohane Funeral Home, in Weymouth, at 40 Sea Street (off of Route 3A-Bicknell Square), followed by a memorial service at 11 AM.