Olan E. ‘Bud’ Hitt Sr., worked at Beth Steel

Olan Edward “Bud” Hitt Sr., a retired Bethlehem Steel worker and a skilled carpenter, died of cancer on Oct. 28 at Seasons Hospice at MedStar Franklin Square Medical Center. The longtime Dundalk resident was 82.

He was born in Clarksburg, W.Va., the son of Hugh Hitt, a steel worker, and Freda Mae McGarry, a homemaker.

Mr. Hitt moved to Baltimore in 1937 with his family after his father took a job at Bethlehem Steel Corp.’s Sparrows Point plant. They later settled in Dundalk.

He attended Baltimore County public schools, then worked as a typesetter and for a rubber stamp firm. In 1955 he began a 40-year career at Bethlehem Steel as a roller on the tandem mills. He retired in 1995.

Mr. Hitt enjoyed carpentry and built a vacation cabin in Berkeley Springs, W.Va. During the 1980s he built a second cabin in Linn, W.Va.

Family members said he also enjoyed working on projects at his Dundalk home and built a new kitchen and a sunroom. He also built decorative cabinets to hold trash cans and a wooden loft for his grandson’s dorm room at the University of Maryland, College Park — he designed it so it could be disassembled and reassembled each year.

Other hobbies included coin collecting and entertaining family and friends. He liked cooking for family gatherings and was known for holiday ham and turkey, Sloppy Joes for Halloween and his chicken-and-stuffing casserole.

He was a longtime member of North Point Baptist Church in Dundalk.

Funeral services were held Wednesday at Duda-Ruck Funeral Home in Dundalk.

He is survived by a son, Olan E. “Eddie” Hitt Jr. of Dundalk; two daughters, Andrea Hitt and Sherryl “Sherri” Wood, both of Dundalk; two brothers, Jim Hitt of Linn, W.Va., and Bill Hitt of Nebo, N.C.; a sister, Barbara Friese of Dundalk; six grandchildren; 11 great-grandchildren; and girlfriend Mae Pavlovich of Baltimore. A marriage to the former Frances Sponaugle ended in divorce.