Former Arizona biz columnist Heltsley dies

Ernie Heltsley, a business columnist and real estate reporter for the Arizona Daily Star, died May 4 in a hospice at age 79, reports the newspaper.

Carmen Duarte writes, “John Bolton, who was Heltsley’s editor for several years, said he was a tenacious investigative reporter with deep knowledge about the key local players in business and real estate, and their roles in Tucson’s economic booms and busts.

“‘Ernie had also done a lot of hard-nosed reporting about organized crime, and he was surprised one year to receive a Christmas card from Bill Bonanno,’ the son of retired Mafia crime family boss Joe Bonanno, Bolton recalled. ‘He didn’t know whether to be amused or worried.’

“He was among Star reporters who extensively covered the 1976 car bombing death of Arizona Republic investigative reporter Don Bolles.

“Heltsley wrote a self-published book, ‘A Stroll Through Egypt and Paradise,’ after he retired. Southern Illinois is known as ‘Little Egypt’; Paradise is a town in western Kentucky celebrated in a 1970s song. Heltsley concentrated on the decades between 1920 and 1950 when his father was a Kentucky coal miner.”

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