Obit: Thess, Henry (1877 - 1961)

Contact: stan@wiclarkcountyhistory.org

Surnames: Thess, Dralla, Wardell, Gustafson, Brandt, Gatz, Miller, Tinyan, Platt

----Source: OWEN ENTERPRISE (Owen, Clark County, Wis.) 10/26/1961

Thess, Henry (5 MAR 1877 - 21 OCT 1961)

The joviality shared by Henry Thess and his wife, Ida, while sitting in the living room of their home on route 1, Owen, Town of Green Grove (Clark Co., Wis.), Saturday afternoon was suddenly stilled by death when Henry suffered a heart attack.

His death was sudden but peaceful.  The only warning of his being ill was the detection of a heart condition about a year ago which he and members of his family had respected.

He was 84 years, 7 months and 16 days of age, being born March 5, 1877, in Iowa.

Funeral services were held at 2:00 o’clock Tuesday afternoon from the Hoeper and Kraut Funeral Home.  Rev. H.A. Timmermann officiated, with burial being made at Riverside Cemetery.  Serving as pallbearers were Lester Kallberg, Arvid Landgren, Dan Fredericks, Ross Braithwaite, Cornelius Driscoll and John Wisniewski.

Henry Thess and his wife, the former Ida Dralla, exchanged the vows of matrimony on March 7, 1906, at Davenport, Iowa.  In 1919 the family moved to Clark County, settling on their present farm in the Town of Green Grove.  He found relief from the laborious taks of farming in his family on the recreation derived from fishing.

Sharing his passing, along with his wife, are two sons, Fred of rural Owen, and Herbert of Curtiss; six daughters, Mrs. Lester (Edna) Wardell, Elkhart Lake, Mrs. Hilmer (Alice) Gustafson and Mrs. Ebner (Clara) Gustafson, Owen, Mrs. Joe  (Be??) Brandt, Withee, Mrs. Arthur (Eileen) Gatz and Mrs. Cliff (Louisa) Miller, Clarendon, Hills, Ill.; one sister, Mrs. Katie Tinyan, Bettendorf, Iowa; two brothers, Peter, Grand Mound, Iowa, and Fred and a half-brother, John Platt of Buena Vista, Iowa; 11 grandchildren and 7 great-grandchildren.