On AU’s campus, Michael Hazilla was known for his trademark bowtie. But everywhere else, he was known for his racing bib.
The world-class marathoner and AU economics professor died Oct. 21 at the age of 64 of a rare viral infection.
Hazilla contracted the infection over the summer while visiting his sister and niece in Oregon. The infection led to a rare nerve disease, known as Miller Fisher Syndrome. He died after spending several months in a Portland hospital.
Hazilla came to AU in 1988 and specialized in the economic modeling of environmental policy, according to Economics Department Chair Robert Blecker.
Hazilla always came to work dressed in a suit and bowtie, toting his signature briefcase and bushy beard.
“It’s very tragic,” Blecker said. “He was a healthy man who died relatively young. It’s a real shock to lose him.”
Blecker said Hazilla came to AU after seven years as a research fellow at Resources for the Future, a D.C. environmental organization.
Hazilla was very passionate about his field, Blecker said.
“He’s a very dynamic teacher,” he said. “Students used to tell me that my lecture style reminded of his, and that was a compliment.”
Denis McDonald, Hazilla’s running partner, said the professor was an interesting man. The two ran 16 to 20 miles every Sunday morning for the past five years.
“If anyone wanted to talk to him about running, he always, always made the time and would take an interest in that person,” McDonald said.
McDonald said Hazilla was incredibly modest and rarely mentioned anything about having been one of the nation’s top marathoners in the late 1960s and early 1970s.
Up until he contracted the fatal viral infection, he was still running races, winning his age group and often beating out men 10 years younger.
“Here’s this guy in incredible shape, vegetarian … running like he was a 50-year-old,” he said. “I had to make sure I stayed in shape to run with him.”
During their Sunday runs through the rural parts of Howard County, Md., McDonald and Hazilla would discuss pretty much anything — including Hazilla’s love of animals.?
“My own dog would love when Michael would come over,” McDonald said.
Blecker said Hazilla was renowned for his work on applying general equilibrium methods to environmental economics, the careful estimation of micro-level production functions and the application of Bayesian methods in econometrics.
His work has been published in several journals, including the Journal of Econometrics and Journal of Political Economy.
AU Economics Professor James Bono graduated from AU in 2003 and was in Hazilla’s intermediate microeconomics class when he was a student here. Bono described Hazilla as very organized and meticulous.
McDonald said Hazilla often talked about his work during their Sunday runs. Hazilla would say that humans need to keep the planet safe from global warming, over-farming and ecological economics.
McDonald added that Hazilla often talked about his students, saying they were so fragile — that he wanted to teach them but not break their spirits.
“American University was lucky to have him,” McDonald said.
sdazio@theeagleonline.com
