Heather Bellow is reporting for The Berkshire Eagle Donald MacGillis, a former Boston Globe editorial writer and The Berkshire Eagle executive editor, died last week after a 50-foot fall while hiking on Mount Katahdin [Kah-TAH-din] in Maine. MacGillis, 74, of Pittsfield had been on an expedition with his 25-year-old nephew, Paul MacGillis. After starting out in good weather, the pair got lost in the fog and struggled against fierce winds on the Knife’s Edge trail Tue., Oct. 6. They took shelter under a rock overhang as temperatures dropped below freezing, and in the very early morning hours, MacGillis stood up and stepped away, falling down the rocks. He suffered chest injuries and a broken leg. He was eventually transported to a hospital in Bangor, where he died several hours later, his son Alec MacGillis said. MacGillis graduated from Yale University with a degree in English in 1968. After working for The Hartford Courant, he joined The Eagle at age 25 in September 1971, originally serving as a reporter in the newspaper’s Southern Berkshire bureau in Great Barrington. MacGillis worked at the paper until 1995. He then joined the Boston Globe as an editorial writer that same year. He later served as The Globe’s national politics editor before retiring in 2012. The Eagle family was devastated by the news, Bellow writes. “MacGillis regarded journalism as the noblest of professions. A newsman through and through, he loved breaking the news and demanded that journalists dig deep and investigate and report the sides of the story the public wasn’t getting,” said Kevin Moran, The Eagle’s executive editor. Read the full story in The Berkshire Eagle.