Mrs. Jean S. Hilliard (STH ’92)
This obituary was originally posted by Dignity Memorial and can be found here.
Jean Judson Squire Hilliard, beloved wife of Hugh Conway Hilliard, Jr., died on Monday, April 29, 2024, at home, in Yarmouth Port, Massachusetts, cared for to the end by a faithful team of family and caregivers. She was 86.
Jean was born on August 30, 1937, the first daughter to Marjorie Hurlburt Squire and the Rev. Roger Squire. She and her sisters, Pat and Carol, grew up in the sweet and simple goodness of being the minister’s daughters in the small town of Red Bank, New Jersey. Her family’s first trip to the Silver Bay YMCA in 1945 began 79 years of joyful August weeks on Lake George in New York.
Jean was a religious studies major at Vassar College, graduating in 1959. In the fall of her junior year, she met Hugh when he came to the Thanksgiving Sunday service at her father’s Methodist church, and she invited him home for lunch. So started a 65-year marriage rich with love, trust, kindness, and mutual respect.
Living first in Massachusetts for Hugh’s career in computer engineering, Jean and Hugh had three children—Marjorie, Conway and Jeff. Later settling for twelve years in Newport News, Virginia, Jean happily committed herself to raising a family and working as an elementary school librarian. When their children finished high school and left home, and following a three-year stint as the book-mobile librarian in Stroudsburg, Pennsylvania, Jean and Hugh returned to Massachusetts.
Jean earned a library science degree from Simmons College and a Master of Divinity at Boston University. Combining her life-long pleasure in books, education, and the spiritual journey, Jean worked as the librarian for the Swedenborg School of Religion—a job that brought her meaningful community and professional satisfaction.
Jean allowed herself to be matured by tragedy, the most piercing of which was the 1991 death of her daughter, Marjorie, who was then a new mother to Megan and Zach. Jean followed her spiritual path with restless earnestness and intellectual curiosity, flowing from the root Christianity of her childhood, through feminist theology, Unitarianism, Eastern Spirituality, and back to an expanded faith.
When Jean retired to Cape Cod, she founded a neighborhood book club, walked most days to the pier at Gray’s Beach, and served on the boards of the Cape Cod Museum of Art and the Yarmouth Port library. She created an abundance of memory books threading her family’s history and expansion, and was committed to the practices of sketching, journaling, and gratitude. At the CCMA, Jean nurtured the museum library into a collection of 1500 catalogued books on American Art.
Jean paid attention to the state of the world and eagerly acted in direct, local and personal ways to improve people’s lives. Steered by her sense of generous responsibility and held by the tender belongings of marriage and family, Jean honored the richness of her own life, convinced that what truly matters is how one lives life, here & now. The last years of Jean’s life were heavily shaped by her long, slow process of diminishment through dementia.
Jean Squire Hilliard was predeceased by her husband, Hugh; her dear sister, Patricia Louise Squire; and her daughter, Marjorie Hilliard Hodges. Jean is survived by her sister, Carol Squire Hay, her sons, Conway Hilliard and Jeff Hilliard; her grandchildren, Megan Hodges, Zach Hodges, Alex Hilliard, Holly Hilliard and Phineas Hilliard; their partners; her nieces and nephews; and her great granddaughter, Artemis Hilliard-Kuykendall-LeBerth.