You had to see it to believe it, Nancy Hunt said, but animals really had a thing for her husband.
“I’ve seen the man just sitting there, and a bird will land on his finger, and I mean a wild bird,” she said, her voice filled with wonder, as if seeing it again for the first time. “Little animals would just come eat out of his hand. Animals just flocked to him.”
James “Blue” and Hilda Chilton remembered a similar occurrence during a vacation trip to Florida several years ago. While visiting the aviary at Busch Gardens, something remarkable happened, Hilda Chilton said.
“When we walked in, the birds scattered,” she said. “But as we were walking along, they’d come and one would light on Bill’s shoulder. He just had magic when it came to animals.”
It wasn’t just the birds, his wife said. Hunt’s animal followers included cats, dogs and goats. Family and friends lovingly nicknamed him “Dr. Dolittle,” “the beast master” and “the animal whisperer.”
“He was just amazing when it came to animals,” his wife said, “but he was pretty amazing about other things, too. He wasn’t one to sit still.”
After Hunt retired from working with sheet metal, he took up goat farming, restored a few vintage cars and started building three-wheeled motorcycles.
William Eldred Hunt Jr., called Bill by most, of Stone Mountain died July 19 from complications of kidney cancer. He was 68.
A memorial service is planned for Saturday at the home he shared with his wife of 27 years. A.S. Turner & Sons was in charge of cremation arrangements.
Hunt, who was born in Atlanta, lived in California and Alabama before he came back to the Peach State to work in the sheet metal industry. He later went into business for himself as a metal worker, his wife said. He retired in 1995, not because he had to, but because he thought his skills could be used elsewhere.
“One of our daughters was in a car accident in 1992 and is quadriplegic,” Nancy Hunt said. “He spent all kinds of time fixing up a place for her here on the property and making sure she could get anywhere she wanted to go out here.”
The 18 acres the Hunts call home was also where Bill Hunt had a shop, or two or three. There is the space where he restored cars and converted traditional motorcycles to three-wheeled affairs, and there is also the model railroad city he built for his grandchildren. He also built furniture and raised Nigerian dairy goats.
“He built a pasture and a barn, and we got the goats,” Nancy Hunt said. “He just loved to work with his hands and build things, and he took a lot of pride in what he did.”
Hunt’s handiwork is what motivated his wife to hold his memorial service at their home, she said.
“He renovated the houses on the property and did everything to make it as beautiful as it is,” she said. “He loved this property, and it is fitting that it be here, for him.”
In addition to his wife, Hunt is survived by sons, Trey Hunt of Stone Mountain, Chris Hunt of Stone Mountain, and Heath Hunt of Lilburn; daughters, Tiffany Hunt of Jonesboro, Danica Hunt Wright of Loganville, Jessica Lane of Stone Mountain, and Cara Hunt Dury of Stone Mountain; sister, Jackie Hogue of Dawsonville; brother, Harry Hunt of Loganville; and nine grandchildren.
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