A reporter for the Madison, Wisc., Capital Times from 1951 to 1995, Hunter “served as the conscience of our newsroom, the epitome of what it meant to be called a great newspaperman,” said the paper’s editor, Dave Zweifel.
Hunter set the tone for his career very early on: in a 1951 Independence Day story during the height of the McCarthy “Red Scare”, Hunter typed up a copy of the Declaration of Independence in the form of a petition and asked 112 people if they were willing to sign it. Only one would; 20 accused him of being a Communist, and many others said they “feared repercussions if they signed any petitions.”
President Harry Truman called the newspaper’s editor to congratulate him for running the story. Hunter lamented the damage McCarthy did to the American sense of liberty, and spent much of his career fighting for civil rights as a political reporter. He died November 26 at age 87 after several years of fighting heart problems.