A remembrance of Jim Dilts, historian, journalist and steadfast friend
By Mark Reutter, Baltimore Brew, 9 May 2018
James Dothard Dilts, who died yesterday at age 81 after a short illness, had many talents. A journalist, historian, book author, carpenter and sailor, he was also a jazz connoisseur, documentary filmmaker, friend of artists and a leader of Baltimore’s preservation movement.
His presence will be missed in those diverse spheres even as his legacy will grow thanks to what he’s left behind – not just a written record of hundreds of articles and a half dozen books, but an elegance of manner capped by an infectious grin that drew many into his orbit.
Insofar as describing himself, Jim liked to recall the day he emerged from a dusty railroad tunnel in West Virginia (part of his hands-on research of the Baltimore & Ohio Railroad) only to be confronted by a bewildered local.
“You some kind of enTHUsiast?” the man asked the hot and begrimed city slicker.
Jim cherished that description and, as time went by, his enthusiasm for his adopted hometown only multiplied as he battled to preserve Fells Point from foolish development, covered the local jazz scene for DownBeat and unearthed such buried treasures as Baby Lawrence, the legendary tap dancer who had fallen on hard times.