[2] Hoff attended Williams College, where he studied English, but postponed graduation for two years in order to serve in World War II.

[3] He attained the rank of Seaman First Class with the rating of quartermaster (the Navy's term for a navigator), and was discharged in 1946.

[10] Hoff was also an officer of the Chittenden County Bar Association[11] and a member of the Burlington-Lake Champlain Chamber of Commerce board of directors.

[13] As a legislator, Hoff was a member of the "Young Turks," a bipartisan alliance of progressive and reform minded representatives and senators that included Republicans Franklin S. Billings Jr. and Ernest W. Gibson III.

During his governorship, he pioneered unprecedented environmental, development, and social welfare programs, including the creation of the Governor's Commission on the Status of Women.

[18] Concerned about racial justice, he joined with New York Mayor John Lindsay to co-found the Vermont-New York Youth Project, which brought minority students from the city together with Vermont students to work on joint summer projects at several Vermont colleges.

[19] According to the Boston Globe, the program, which temporarily doubled Vermont's black population, "uncovered some latent bigotry that had not been visible before.

[22] He also served in various advisory and honorary positions and as President of the Board of Trustees at Vermont Law School as well as continuing his work as a lawyer in private practice.