DATE: Tuesday, November 25, 1997            TAG: 9711250589

SECTION: LOCAL                   PAGE: B1   EDITION: FINAL 
SOURCE: BY TOM SHEAN, STAFF WRITER 

DATELINE: NORFOLK                           LENGTH:  106 lines

HUNTER HOGAN, REAL ESTATE TITAN AND NATIVE SON, DIES AT AGE 87

Hunter A. Hogan Jr., a Norfolk native who helped shape Hampton Roads through his civic endeavors and business acumen, died Monday after being injured in an auto accident. He was 87.

Hogan had been hospitalized in Sentara Norfolk General since the accident on Nov. 15.

A Norfolk resident, Hogan earned the respect of colleagues and competitors for his willingness to share his fabled knowledge of real estate and to champion causes that did not enjoy broad public support.

In recent years, for example, he gathered funds for a languishing effort to build a memorial in Norfolk to the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr., the slain civil rights leader.

``Hunter said he was determined to see the memorial brought to a conclusion and, by gosh, he did it,'' said Vincent J. Mastracco Jr., an attorney with the Norfolk firm Kaufman & Canoles P.C. ``He got on the phone and prevailed on people he knew and some people he didn't know.''

Feisty and outspoken, Hogan was never shy about expressing his strongly held opinions, especially on real estate and development matters.

In the late 1960s - long before regionalism had become an issue in Hampton Roads - he urged Norfolk and Newport News to build a regional, international airport in the Bowers Hill section of Chesapeake.

He criticized the city of Norfolk's efforts in the '70s to turn Granby Street into a shopping mall, and he lived to see the mall torn up, the street repaved.

More recently, he criticized the city's drive to develop the MacArthur Center downtown, saying it will be difficult to draw suburban shoppers to an urban mall.

Acquaintances, however, came to value Hogan's forthrightness, said Joshua P. Darden Jr., a nephew and president of a Norfolk investment concern.

``There was never a hidden agenda with Hunter,'' Darden said. ``He never said anything in a mean-spirited way.''

Hogan was instrumental in the expansion of Goodman Segar Hogan, the Norfolk commercial real estate firm that later became Goodman Segar Hogan Hoffler. He also became a valued adviser to scores of younger people who entered the business.

``All of us saw his tremendous compassion for people,'' said Robert M. Stanton, a retired Goodman Segar Hogan chairman who had been hired by Hogan.

``He provided financial help and personal help to many obscure people. He wasn't doing it to achieve some business goal. He thought there was a need and stepped in to fill it.''

In 1994, the Norfolk Cosmopolitan Club recognized Hogan for his contributions to the community with its First Citizen of the Year Award.

But there was more to Hogan than his charitable concern and affable personality. Individuals who worked with him described his tenacity during the 1970s and early 1980s, when he spent an entire decade helping to develop a large shopping center in Memphis.

``Leasing agents came and went, but he never gave up on it,'' said Deborah K. Stearns, executive vice president of Goodman Segar Hogan Hoffler.

Hogan ended up in real estate by chance. He had enrolled in the University of Virginia in Charlottesville in 1929, but left during the Depression in 1931 to help support his family.

In 1934, while working at Shulman's, a men's apparel store in downtown Norfolk, Hogan was offered a higher-paying job by real estate agent S. Barron Segar. The job: collecting rents in Norfolk tenements.

Hogan's real estate career was interrupted by World War II and a stint in the Navy. He became a lieutenant and served aboard a ship in the Pacific.

When he returned to Norfolk in 1946, Hogan joined Segar and Robert C. Goodman to form Goodman Segar Hogan Inc. Hogan became chairman at the end of 1974 and retired in 1986.

His enthusiasm for the real estate business and appetite for information fostered respect, even among competitors.

``When I came back from the service in 1953, I was trying to decide whether to go into real estate,'' said Harvey L. Lindsay Jr., chairman of Harvey Lindsay Commercial Real Estate. ``Even though my dad was in the business, I went to see Hunter, who talked to me about the future of real estate.''

Over the years, Hogan was active in national real estate organizations, including the International Council of Shopping Centers and the Urban Land Institute. During the 1970s, he served two terms as president of the Washington-based Urban Land Institute, a research-oriented organization.

After seeing surfers in Hawaii during World War II, Hogan took up the sport. He also had been an active skier until a few years ago.

But it was in real estate, not sports, where Hogan found his fun, associates and family members said.

When he retired from Goodman Segar Hogan, Hogan set up a real estate consulting firm and traveled the country providing appraisals of shopping centers and serving as an expert in court cases.

Elizabeth Hogan said Monday that the word ``retirement'' wasn't part of her father's vocabulary.

``Most people expected him to live forever,'' she said. ``I think he had come to believe it.''

Hogan recently told business acquaintances that 1997 had been the best year in real estate he had ever had.

Two years ago, the Virginia Chapter of the International Council of Shopping Centers recognized Hogan's work in real estate with the creation of the Hunter Hogan Award of Excellence. Since then, the organization has presented the award annually to an individual who characterizes professional excellence and ethics in commercial real estate.

Hogan is survived by his wife, the former Mary Payne, six daughters, six grandchildren and five great-grandchildren.

A memorial service will be held at Sacred Heart Catholic Church, 520 Graydon Ave., Norfolk, at 11 a.m. Friday. The family asked that, in lieu of flowers, contributions be made to St. Mary's Infant Home in Norfolk. ILLUSTRATION: Color photo

Norfolk native Hunter Hogan Jr. was thought by many to be an

authority on real estate and development matters.

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