JOHN C. HODEL /
RETIRED NEWSPAPER EDITORWest Virginia newsman
adopted Big Isle as homeMore obituaries
BECKLEY, W.Va. >> John C. Hodel, former longtime editor of the Raleigh Register, died after a fall at his home in Kailua-Kona, Hawaii. He was 83.
Hodel was editor of the Raleigh Register, an afternoon newspaper, and part owner of its parent company, Beckley Newspapers Corp., from the mid-1950s until his retirement in 1976.
The Raleigh Register was later merged with the Post-Herald, a morning newspaper, to form the morning Register-Herald, which is now owned by Community Newspaper Holdings Inc.
Hodel died Sunday in a Honolulu hospital following surgery to repair injuries from the fall, family members said.
Hodel was an early advocate of integration and civil rights for blacks, a pacifist and an anti-war activist. He was one of the founders of the Unitarian Fellowship in Beckley.
A conscientious objector during World War II, Hodel joined the American Field Service and served four years as an ambulance driver in Syria and North Africa. His ambulance unit also accompanied Allied invaders as they made their way through southern France through the Rhone Valley, then along the Rhine and into Germany.
Hodel was awarded the Croix de Guerre, the French military award for heroism in battle.
He is survived by his wife, Beatrice Perlman Hodel; two sons, Daniel, of Kailua-Kona, and Brian, of Rio de Janeiro, Brazil; one brother, Emile J. Hodel, of Houston and Beckley; and one sister, Rose Hodel Chrisley, of Radium Springs, N.M.
