Remembering Cathi Stewart Hines
It is with great sadness that we mourn the passing of Cathi Stewart Hines, health care professional, public servant, and fund advisor of the Skipper and Cathi Hines Charitable Fund. This fund provides grants, with preference given to organizations that support addiction and substance abuse prevention, treatment, and recovery; expand access to mental and physical healthcare; and provide services that benefit youth.
Cathi Stewart Hines
Reprinted from the Outer Banks Voice | March 5, 2026
Cathi Stewart Hines, age 58, passed away peacefully, surrounded by her loving family on March 1, 2026, after a 3 year long courageous battle with cancer. Through her cancer journey, she taught those around her what it looked like to live bravely and always enjoy life with a smile and kind heart. She had a gift for forming lasting bonds and took genuine joy in getting to know others. Cathi will forever be a bright, guiding light and symbol of strength to her family and loved ones. Her conviction and clarity of purpose made her a trusted source of support and wisdom for anyone in her life.
Born in Silver Springs, Maryland on October 12 1967, she was the daughter of Bruce Stewart and the late Joan Stewart. On September 20, 2014, Cathi married Skipper Hines in the backyard of a beloved friend’s house in Kitty Hawk, NC after dating for more than 11 years. They spent more than 30 years living on the Outer Banks before moving together to Youngsville, NC where Cathi lived out the later years of her life.
Together, Cathi and her husband, Skipper, built a life rich with joyful memories—traveling with friends, enjoying NASCAR races and football games, spending sunny days fishing and tubing in the Colington Sound, and returning often to her cherished St. John.
A highly respected Registered Nurse, Cathi dedicated over two decades to the medical field. After earning her nursing degree from the College of The Albemarle, she spent years caring for the Outer Banks community at Carolina Surgical Care and the Dare County Health Department.
She concluded her distinguished career at the Durham County Health Department, where she served for 11 years as their Communicable Disease Nurse —a role that utilized her sharp intellect and deep commitment to public health. Driven by a relentless work ethic, Cathi found great fulfillment in service—whether she was providing one-on-one patient care or safeguarding the health of the entire community.
She viewed her work as a true extension of her character, ensuring that her hallmark generosity and kindness left a lasting impression on every colleague and patient she encountered.
Cathi lived for her family, pouring her soul into her role as a mother and constantly creating lifelong memories for her children, Margot and Bryce Ostrander. An unwavering source of wisdom, Cathi was deeply invested in her children’s journeys—offering steady guidance through their education and life’s turning points, while always remaining a phone call away for emotional support or a simple, curious question. The bedrock of the family, Cathi never missed a moment of her children’s lives.
She was their compass, teaching them that a life well-lived is built on kindness, pride, and hard work. In every challenge, she was their primary source of counsel—a mother whose presence was as unwavering as her love. Of all her many accomplishments, Cathi considered her role as a mother to be her most profound and cherished legacy.
Cathi was most at home in her garden, a happy place where her legendary green thumb turned the earth into a testament of patience and beauty. Whether perfecting a dahlia or tending to her tomatoes, she lived for the joy of sharing her harvest with friends, neighbors, and colleagues. Beyond the soil, Cathi’s wisdom was her greatest gift: she taught us all that growth requires both grit and grace.
She leaves us with the reminder that the most beautiful things in life—like the family and community she nurtured—flourish only when you are brave enough to get your hands dirty.
Cathi is survived by her loving husband, Skipper Hines; her children, Margot Ostrander and Bryce Ostrander and his wife, Cori; her father, Bruce Stewart, and his wife, Connie; and her brother, Michael Stewart, and his wife, Malena.
In lieu of flowers, the family asks that people donate to the Skipper and Cathi Hines Charitable Fund at the Outer Banks Community Foundation via https://obcf.org/ or PO Box 2299 Manteo, NC 27954.
