Tilot (Hoida, Hall), Kathleen (Kathie)

Well, Kathie was right. She really didn’t feel well after all.

Kathie Tilot, loved by millions as Kathie Hall, and admired by a select few as “Kathie Radio-voice,” passed away recently from any number of reasons.

It may have been from the combined effects of walking through the electric fence around her yard with her dog’s collar in her pocket; or from the degeneration of her knee joints on her freakish “farm girl legs.”

Our heroine grew up as Kathie Hoida (the first in a long succession of surnames) on a farm in Kewaunee County. After acquiring the requisite farm girl gait that would haunt her throughout her adult life, Kathie found her first love of being on the radio. Few people enjoyed hearing themselves talk as much as our dear Kathie.

Despite having to play an endless succession of polkas in 18-hour shifts on WAUN Radio in Kewaunee in her early years, Kathie was convinced she had found her calling. The alter-ego that would later become her trademark “Kathie Radio-voice” personality began to develop during this period, when all of 14 farmers and 42 cows would hang on her every word spiced between the oom-pahs.

Her passion for fine music eventually led her to a career as a groupie for her long-haired boyfriend’s band, High Flyer. Glen Tilot eventually came out from behind his drum set long enough to make this fine-lookin’ groupie his wife, and together the couple produced three children.

Spaced equally apart in intervals of six years (it takes awhile to build up that kind of passion, apparently), she is survived in addition to Glen by Ryan (Lauren), Betsy and Tessa.

Kathie Radio-voice’s smooth, half-octave lower voiceovers will continue to grace the on-hold messages at St. Mary’s Hospital Medical Center in Green Bay as though she was still with us. Like the ghost of Sr. Marie of the Immaculate Conception a century earlier, Kathie’s familiar “chshshsh” giggle can still be heard in A Woman’s Place and the Marketing & Communications Department.

Kathie chose to be cremated instead of placed in a wooden coffin, because she didn’t want to harm any trees in the process of dying. She was, first and foremost, a tree-hugger at heart.

A public farewell service will be held to honor her legacy, which has yet to be determined. Visitors are asked to relate their favorite Kathie story, and a keepsake book is planned from the resulting hilarity.

As much as your friends would like to take the rap for your untimely demise, Kathie, this time it truly is all your fault.

This fun-filled sendoff was approved by Kathie prior to her death. She requests that you remember the joy with which she lived her life, and have peace in knowing she lives today in paradise with the Lord.