Gretchen Hartzler Obituary

Gretchen I. Rahn Hartzler

Born: March 31, 1931

Died: March 18, 2017

Gretchen Irene Rahn Hartzler, 85, died Saturday, March 18, at the Chase Center in Logansport, Indiana.

Born March 31, 1931, to German immigrants Hans and Frieda Rahn, she grew up on a farm in Westmont, IL, where they raised chickens and bred dachshunds. She was a 1949 graduate of Hinsdale Township High School. She worked briefly as a secretary at Argonne National Laboratory and was studying for a career as a teacher when her sister set her up on a blind date with Melvin Hartzler. Both sisters wed the men they dated for the first time that night, with Gretchen and Mel marrying in August of 1951. The two settled in a home adjacent to the Rahn family farm and quickly began raising a family of their own. They moved to Michigan in 1957, then on to New York, ultimately resettling in Chappaqua, New York in 1960.

She loved the family's annual trips to a church camp in New Hampshire (where she went for 28 consecutive years) and trips home to Westmont by car and by train. She was an avid knitter, gardener (with a particular love for growing pole beans and zinnias), and baker, making a pie or cake from scratch nearly every day when her children were young.

Sadly, in the early 1960s Gretchen began battling mental illness, a fight that she would continue for the rest of her life, often enduring lengthy hospitalizations. She and Mel divorced in 1984 and she returned to the Chicago area the following year and lived in a succession of supported living facilities. For several years she volunteered at a school, working in the library and reading to children. She enjoyed outings to parks and loved a cup of coffee, a glass of wine and a cigarette.

She is preceded in death by her parents, two sisters, Marlene Rahn Araya and Marian Rahn Vimtrup; and a brother, William Rahn.

She is survived by her ex-husband, one son, Carl (Terry) Hartzler, 64 of Valencia, CA; and three daughters, Linda Murray, 62, of Logansport, IN, Christine (Robert) Suda, 58, of Katonah, NY, and Elizabeth (Andrew) Seeds, 54, of New Fairfield, CT. She also is survived by eight grandchildren, Robert and Megan Suda, Whitney and Alex Seeds, Rebecca and Allison Hartzler and Elizabeth and Jacob Murray; as well as three great grandchildren and many nieces and nephews.

The family will host a memorial service for Gretchen, noon until 4:00 p.m., Saturday, April 1, at the Toon Funeral Home, 109 N. Cass Ave., in Westmont.