Mystery surrounds death of MIT grad whose Streeterville apartment contained explosive chemicals

Theodore Hilk was found dead earlier this month in his Streeterville apartment. | LinkedIn

Theodore Hilk, 30, was found dead Wednesday after his father drove from Kansas to check on his well-being, said Chicago police officials, who are continuing to investigate.

When he was a math student at the prestigious Massachusetts Institute of Technology in 2013, Ted Hilk’s online profile included a famous English verse called “The Fifth of November.”

“Remember, remember! The fifth of November. The gunpowder treason and plot,” the poem begins, referring to Guy Fawkes, who was arrested while guarding explosives plotters hid under the House of Lords in London more than 400 years ago.

It’s unclear why Hilk chose to highlight that verse. Was he a fan of the 2005 film “V for Vendetta,” which featured Fawkes? Was he in tune with protesters who wear Fawkes masks in anti-government demonstrations around the world? Or did he just like the poem?

Whatever the reason, the verse about stashed explosives offers a strange parallel to the mystery surrounding 30-year-old Hilk’s recent death in a seventh-floor apartment at 240 E. Illinois St. in the Streeterville neighborhood. His decomposing body was found there Wednesday along with a toxic, volatile chemical – azide — that’s used in bomb triggers and airbags, authorities said.

Hilk’s father traveled from Shawnee, Kansas, a suburb of Kansas City, to check on the well-being of his son, contacting Chicago police officers who found the body, CPD Supt. David Brown said. The police bomb unit removed potentially explosive materials from Hilk’s apartment Thursday, officials said. Police say they’re continuing to investigate Hilk’s death and officers returned to the apartment Friday to continue their search for evidence. The results of an autopsy are pending.

Tyler LaRiviere/Sun-Times

Emergency crews outside the apartment building in Streeterville where the body of Theodore Hilk was found.

By many accounts, Hilk was brilliant. His hometown newspaper published a story on his getting a perfect 36 on his ACT college entrance exam, the first-ever at his school. He told a reporter he didn’t study for the test. In high school, Hilk was involved in robot-building contests, a “science Olympiad” and the jazz band, according to the story.

In college, the subjects that caught his eye included computer models that simulated the cerebral cortex of the brain, according to a web post from that time. On one of his college-era posts, Hilk said his nickname was “Arbitrage,” which is the simultaneous buying and selling of stock, currency or commodities to take advantage of differences in prices for the same asset.

Hilk’s LinkedIn page said he’d worked for several financial firms, most recently Headlands Technologies, where he was employed until September 2015, according to a company spokeswoman. Neighbors in his apartment building said they didn’t know anything about Hilk, whom they described as a loner. His family couldn’t be reached for comment.

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