Santa Fe lost a civic activist and a man with a singular passion for his adopted home Friday when writer and woodworker Kingsley Hammett collapsed and died while hiking on the Dale Ball Trails east of downtown.

Hammett, who wrote two highly acclaimed books about Santa Fe, knew as much about the city as any historian, said longtime friend Gloria Mendoza. "That's how passionate he was," she said. "You don't find that usually in people who are not native born. I respected him for that."

Hammett, 63, worked in the background on many community issues. Mendoza said she met him in 1992 when they were both opposing a proposal to build a golf course in La Cienega. "We worked toward getting the elected officials and the developers to realize the impact this was going to have on the agricultural community," Mendoza said.

Hammett took civic responsibility seriously, said his wife, Jerilou. "He believed that citizens had a big role to play in shaping the values of the community and fighting for those values to make the city a better place to live. He always did that."

In 1989, he joined his neighbors in protesting rezoning of 25 acres on the west side to permit an industrial park. And the following year he argued passionately for a stronger response to the problem of weapons on school campuses.

When he died, Hammett and his wife were removing dead trees along the trail that were smothering the live ones.

Hammett was born and raised in New Jersey. He attended Kent School in northwestern Connecticut and graduated from the University of Vermont in 1967. He served as a lieutenant aboard the USS Arlington in the Tonkin Gulf during the Vietnam War. A freelance writer for the Washington Post and Baltimore Sun after his military service, he went on to become part owner and founding publisher of the Washington Tribune, a free community tabloid in Washington, D.C.

In 1979, Hammett earned a master's from the University of Missouri School of Journalism, where he was editor of the editorial page of the Columbia Missourian, the school's daily paper. Before becoming the business editor of The New Mexican later that year, he covered the statehouse in Jefferson city, Mo., for the Missouri Press News.

In 2002, he earned a second master's from California State University, Dominguez Hills, in humanities-history.

Hammett had "very high ideals" when he entered journalism, his wife said. "He believed that covering the news in an aggressive and honest and independent way was one of the biggest safeguards of American democracy."

"He was a good journalist; he was trying to do it right," recalled Richard McCord, co-founder of the Santa Fe Reporter. McCord said when Hammett heard about a joint investigation into what caused the 1980 riot at the state penitentiary, he wanted in. Eventually the story was published in the Reporter, The New Mexican, and on a radio and a television station in Albuquerque.

After leaving journalism, Hammett was publisher of DESIGNER/builder, a magazine he co-founded with his wife. He wrote three books on New Mexico furniture, including one published by Red Crane and two with his own Fleetwood Press, which were distributed by the UNM Press. Two other books, Santa Fe: A Walk Through Time and The Essence of Santa Fe, which he authorized with his wife and designer Peter Scholz, were widely admired.

Marianne O'Shaughnessy of Red Crane said Saturday, "We are very saddened. He seemed to be hitting his stride. His (death) is a loss to our little publishing community."

"He was one of the most intelligent and compassionate people I have known in my life," Mendoza said. "He and Jerilou had this unbinding love for each other."

In addition to his wife, Hammett is survived by a stepdaughter, Anya Maria Mayans.

Contact Anne Constable at 986-3022 or aconstable@sfnewmexican.com.