[2] On May 19, 1939, Wilkin was nominated by President Franklin D. Roosevelt to a seat on the United States District Court for the Northern District of Ohio vacated by Judge Samuel H. West.

He assumed senior status due to a certified disability on August 31, 1949, serving in that capacity until his death on February 23, 1973.

[2] He died in Cleveland, and was buried at the Wilkin family mausoleum at Maple Grove Cemetery in New Philadelphia.

[3] Wilkin was a Mason, an Elks Lodge member, Delta Kappa Epsilon, Phi Delta Phi, and a Presbyterian Church member.

In 1911, he married Norma Fertig of Dover, Ohio, and their only child, a daughter born in 1912, died in 1918.