FORT EDWARD & STARKSBORO, VT – George Edward Hall III, Terry to his friends and family, passed away October 17, 2020 from complications of heart disease.
He was born in Claremont, New Hampshire to the late George E. Hall, Jr. and Nancy (Brooks) Hall on November 20, 1938.
He grew up in the Edgemont section of Scarsdale, New York. Terry graduated from Bronxville High School and attended Cornell University. In 1961 he moved with the family to Starksboro, Vermont and began a very varied and interesting life.
Terry traveled to Alaska with John Teal to capture musk oxen and establish a Musk Ox farm to benefit the indigenous people. This was followed by working in Point Barrow, Alaska for the University of Alaska’s Naval Arctic Research Laboratory. Back in Vermont he was employed for several years by the Shelburne Shipyard. All his life Terry was an avid birder whose ideal vacation was traveling the country, usually with some birder friends, in search of a new lifer and eventually compiling a list of well over 700 species.
Terry was a very kind and gentle person but one plagued with an addiction that weighed heavily on his life and relationships. He made many very good friends who, to their credit, knowing his problems still stood by him. Even in trying times the naturalist in him came forward.
While incarcerated in West Virginia he became known as “The Moth Man” collecting moths attracted and killed by the bright lights. Terry identified and cataloged them, finding several species previously unknown in West Virginia. When he left the state his collection was given to West Virginia University.
Besides his parents, he was predeceased by his brother, Jared.
He is survived by his brother and sister-in-law, Robert and Blair Hall; his nieces, Heather Ragsdale and Meridith McFarland; his nephew, Renwick Hall, all of Starksboro; his cousins, Nancy Savage and Denny Grady of Michigan.
At some time in the future there will be a gathering to spread his ashes on the family farm.
Cards may be sent to Bob Hall, 101 Stave Brook Drive, Starksboro, VT 05487 or perhaps a small donation to your favorite wildlife charity.
I just heard of Terry’s passing. He was a colleague of my husband, Henry Seely. They went to Edgemont school together. I met him a few times and quite the birder! We spoke with him in July and I sent him a book that I thought he would enjoy.
I’m really sorry to hear of his passing. I have saved several of his letters that he wrote to Bill over the years.
Terry Hall was a friend of my parents when we lived in Fairbanks, Alaska from 1966 to 1970. He was a close and trusted friend who molested and raped my four year old sister, threatening to kill her and her family if she ever told on him. She suffered under his “addiction” for four long years of lost childhood. When he was found out, he ran like a coward, and eventually landed in Barrow, Alaska where he continued his depraved lifestyle and victimized little native Alaskan girls.
Those who knew of his criminal behavior
yet said and did nothing are to be credited only as accomplices concealing his weird and twisted world.He continued his behavior in prison, a predator, illuminating a false light for his unsuspecting victims, who he used only as trophies in his personal collection.