Jonathan Roberts Tyson Hughes, a native of Twin Falls, Idaho, died of cancer May 30, 1992, in Evanston, Illinois.
A memorial service will be held for him in Twin Falls, Idaho, 1 p.m. Saturday, June 6, in the Twin Falls LDS Stake Center, 421 Maurice Street North, Twin Falls. Officiating will be Leonard J. Arrington, Salt Lake City.Jonathan Hughes was born on April 23, 1928, in Wenatchee, Washington, the son of Benjamin Bartholomew and Rachel Ward Hughes. His father died in an automobile accident when John was a baby and his mother relocated with John, and his older sister and brother in Twin Falls, her home town. His mother, having later married Jack Brown, died in Twin Falls in 1987.
A graduate of Twin Falls High School, John played football and was one of the region's finest clarinetists. He attended Utah State University, graduating in economics in 1950. After two years at the University of Washington, he received a Rhodes Scholarship to Oxford, where he earned a D. Phil. in economics in 1955, studying with the finest economists in England.
At Oxford, John met Mary Gray Stilwell, a Texas studying anthropology, and they were married in 1953. A son, Benjamin, was born in 1960, and twin daughters, Charis and Margaret, were born in 1962.
John worked for the Federal Reserve Bank of New York, Purdue University, Columbia University, University of California at Berkeley, and spent the last 30 years as a professor of economic history at Northwestern University in Evanston, Illinois. He has been a Distinguished Professor of Economics and Robert E. and Emily King Professor of Business Institutions there since 1989. A productive scholar, Dr. Hughes has written widely in the field of economic history, producing a dozen books and more than one hundred professional articles. His book, "The Vital Few: The Entrepreneur and American Economic Progress," won a $25,000 prize from the Kenan Enterprise Center for its celebration of American entrepreneurship. His writing was witty and insightful. He has been a Guggenheim Fellow, Ford Foundation Faculty Fellow, Fellow of All Souls College, Oxford, and president of the Economic History Association. In 1990 he was given an honorary Doctor of Social Science degree from Utah State University. The same year, his former students and colleagues published a festscrift in his honor entitled "The Vital One: Essays in Honor of Jonathan R.T. Hughes".
Dr. Hughes is survived by his wife, Mary Gray Hughes, Evanston, Ill.; his son, Benjamin
Bartholomew Hughes, Berkeley, Calif.; his daughters, Charis Elizabeth Hughes Barasch, Portland, Oregon; and Margaret Renee Hughes, Boise, Idaho; a sister, Leona Rae Hughes Peters, Henderson, Nev.; and a brother, Benjamin
Bartholomew Hughes VI, Everson, Wash.
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