Delbert Hillgartner

Del Hillgartner of Elmsford died June 24, 2015, after a long battle with cancer. He was born March 29, 1949, in Indianapolis, Indiana but spent his childhood in Tangier, Morocco. While a student at the American School of Tangier, he became friends with the novelist Paul Bowles. Later he studied with the documentary filmmaker Richard Leacock. Both men were great mentors and remained Del's friends for the rest of their lives. After graduating from MIT in 1971 (he was a member of MENSA), Del taught filmmaking and photography at Cooper Union. He also was a contributing editor and featured columnist for The Filmmaker's Newsletter for many years. He married Dinah Kidd in 1987 and they settled in Elmsford, where he remained for the rest of his life. He recently retired as Coordinator of IT at the Westchester Educational Opportunity Center. Del loved travel, history, world music, and especially cartoons and comic books, of which he had an extensive collection. A gifted musician and composer, a published photographer, he will be remembered as a generous soul who loved sharing the things he loved with the ones he loved. He is survived by his wife Dinah, father William, brother Malcolm and his wife Jahnna, sister Deborah and her wife Liz, nephew Dash and niece Skye. He will be missed.