There is sad news from Texas tonight: former Mayor Hamilton passed away this afternoon.
I served my first term on the City Council with Bill and he was a very hard working Mayor who was exceptionally smart and shrewd. He was very helpful to me personally when he pushed to get me elected as a rookie and for that I am eternally grateful. He did a fine job for the city and was not one to be swayed by what was popular even when it looked like it might cost him his seat.
Alot of people do not remember the Override days of 1991. From that low point in city finances, Bill emerged as a real leader for change and it is why the people of the city elected him. While we agreed most of the time, there were exceptions and he always made sure to tell me what he thought. I liked his style although I can say it did not work for all of my colleagues. He was fair and a straight shooter.
Not to be out done, he would be the first to remind everyone of his very talented and gifted wife, Rosemary, who was a Mt. Holyoke graduate. Very sharp lady and very charming.
One of Bill's favorite lines from Shakespeare that he particularly loved to quote towards those who seemed to have forgotten what he delivered from time to time was from King Lear, "Sharper than a serpent's tooth are these the children of ingratitude!" I loved that line and he said it with a certain flair that just made you laugh even if it was directed your way.
Holyoke was lucky to have Bill as our Mayor for 5 years (1991-1996). I know he enjoyed his son, Mark, very much and relocated to Texas from his home on Eastern Promenade to be with him. Mark is quite accomplished as well.
Bill will be remembered fondly and it was a pleasure to have known him. Requiescat in pace.
Former Holyoke Mayor William Hamilton dies in Texas following heart attacks
By MIKE PLAISANCE
mplaisance@repub.com
HOLYOKE - Former Mayor William A. Hamilton, whose tough-minded management was credited with turning around the city during a recession died Monday in Texas. He was 86.
His son Mark F. Hamilton said in a telephone interview that William Hamilton collapsed in his Austin apartment, suffered two cardiac arrests and was pronounced dead at the hospital at 12:11 p.m.
He won a special election for mayor in June 1991. After winning in 1993, Hamilton lost the mayoral seat in an upset in November 1995 to Daniel J. Szostkiewicz, a former city councilor who was nearly three-times younger than Hamilton.
"He died peacefully, with my wife and I at his side," Mark Hamilton said.
Hamilton was mayor here during hard financial times and generally his cost-cutting measures and tightness with the public buck were credited with helping the city through its financial crisis.
Hamilton grew up in the city's Churchill section, and served a term as an alderman in the 1960s.
Later as a businessman with Monsanto Co., Hamilton traveled the world before returning to Holyoke to retire.
He invented a railroad car for Monsanto operations that dumped loads through the bottom rather than having to lift the car up and rotate it.
Hamilton was an iconoclast here - and the Shakespeare-quoting Hamilton probably would have preferred the label "iconoclast" over merely "rebel."
He was a registered Republican mayor in a city run by Democrats.
He pushed to put a gambling casino-resort on Mount Tom, even though that position cost him support of voters in Ward 7 who opposed gaming in their ward.
Hamilton opposed having the city take over the hydroelectric dam here from a utility company, a step later favored in a non-binding referendum by the voters by about a four to one margin.
Among the economic development in his administration was the one-third increase in the size of the Holyoke Mall at Ingleside and development of Holyoke Crossings, a retail block adjacent to the mall.
