Obituaries: Virgil Louis Swing

Virgil Louis Swing, 81, a 1956 Cloquet High School graduate and a retired Duluth newspaper editor, died Saturday, Oct. 26, 2019, in Banner Baywood Medical Center in Mesa, Arizona. He was born in Aitkin, Minnesota in 1938 to Edward and Esther Swing. His family moved to Cloquet soon afterward.

After graduating from the University of Minnesota Duluth in 1960, he enlisted in the Navy and served as a journalist aboard the aircraft carrier the Bonhomme Richard and as a researcher in the Pentagon from 1960 to 1964.

He worked as a reporter at daily newspapers in New Jersey and at the Associated Press in Minneapolis before starting a nearly 30-year career at the Duluth News Tribune in 1969. He worked as a reporter, city editor, sports editor, copy editor and was editorial page editor from 1989 to 1998. He served on the Duluth Planning Commission and worked at the St. Louis County Historical Society Veterans Memorial Hall Project.

He and his wife, Georgia, moved to the Phoenix area in 2013. He was an avid reader and sports fan and a devoted husband, father and grandfather. He was preceded in death by his parents, his sister, Mary Ann Thompson, and his brother Warren (Nita).

In addition to his wife of 41 years, he is survived by two sons, Benjamin (Anastasia) of Gilbert, Arizona, and Edward (Patricia) of Peoria, Arizona; three grandchildren, Daisy, Eleanor and James; and a brother, Richard Swing, of Mankato, Minnesota. His first grandson came into the world on Oct. 26, almost exactly when Virgil left it. The family will hold a private service in Gilbert in November.

Printed in the Pine Knot News, Nov. 1, 2019