Person:Esther Smith (42)

After Ralph Hertsel's death, Esther Hertsel moved in 2001 to live with her daughter Sharon Smith in Elkhart, IN. She lived alone at her apartment from Aug. 5, 1999 until spring of 2001. After a fall she decided she would feel more confident living with her daughter.

After a stroke in 1988 Esther was confined to a wheelchair. She never fully recovered from her stroke. She had speech difficulties. She was sharp and very capable but had some problems with communication caused by the stroke.

Esther also sufferred from great pain from arthritis.

Moved from Indiana to Michigan when she was in 4th grade. U. S. Census shows the family was in Cass County by 1930. Esther may have moved to Cassopolis, MI from a rual Michigan area in the 4th grade.

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Esther Hertsel Obituary Added by dareklet on 27 Oct 2007

ESTHER M. HERTSEL May 31, 1925 - Oct. 23, 2007 In Print: 25a6 obit Hertsel, Esther Published: 10/25/2007 12:00:00 AM Last Updated: 10/24/2007 9:59:02 PM Elkhart Truth

EDWARDSBURG, Mich. -- Esther M. Hertsel, 82, of 69425 M-62 S., died at 9:43 a.m. Tuesday (Oct. 23, 2007) in Elkhart (Ind.) General Hospital.

She was born May 31, 1925, in Whitley County, Ind., to Dorl P. and Ida (Tyler) Smith. She married Ralph L. Hertsel on April 12, 1947 in Elkhart, IN. He preceded her in death Aug. 5, 1999.

Mrs. Hertsel is survived by two sons, David (Cheri) Hertsel of Edwardsburg, MI and Daniel (Gail) Hertsel of Nappanee, Ind.; four daughters, Sharon (John) Smith of Goshen, Ind., Betty (Jerry) Olszewski of Granger, Ind., Diane (John) Areklet of Pentwater, MI and Sally Baucom of Lansing, MI; 14 grandchildren; 16 great-grandchildren; one brother, Jack (Theresa) Smith of Mendham, N.J.; and two sisters-in-law, Jeanene (Ed) Franks of Goshen and Martha Hertsel of Middlebury, Ind.; an aunt Irma Tyler; nieces, nephews and cousins.

She was preceded in death by her parents; one son-in-law, Burler Baucom; two brothers, Russell and William Smith; and two sisters, Ilene Mabie and Marjorie Scott.

Friends may call from 4 to 7 p.m. today at Paul E. Mayhew Funeral Home, 26863 W. Main St., Edwardsburg, and one hour prior to Friday's 1 p.m. funeral service at the funeral home. The Rev. Clearence Dycus, retired Baptist minister of Edwardsburg, will officiate.

Mrs. Hertsel was a former nurse's aide at Cass County Medical Care Facility and cared for her husband in 1960 when he suffered from Rhumatic fever and again in the 1999. She was a member of Ontwa Baptist Church who loved her family, cooking, traveling, camping and crocheting.

Memorials may be given to Hospice or any charity of the donor's choice.

Additional information about this story Description Esther's funeral service was full of family memories, tears and laughter thanks to Rev. Clarence Dycus and her daughter-in-law Gail Hertsel. Gail and Dan,

These are some of my thoughts of Mom. I know that Gail is going to do an eulogy for Mom which is so kind of her to do. I am not good at getting up and talking to a crowd but here are some of my thoughts of Mom.

Love, Diane

Esther was the glue that kept a large family together when times were tough. She was a strong mother that instilled a good work ethic in all of her children. She told her children they had to get up and go to school, they had to get a job, they had to learn to drive, and they had to take care of what they had. She delighted in her first grandchild Wade and every new grandchild was like a first grandchild.

She made pies that tasted like they were from heaven. After suffering a stroke in 1988, she tried to pass the trade on to her husband Ralph. He tried but to no avail, they both laughed when they realized they had made a huge mess, but to them the pie tasted good.

My last visit with her we watched a TV program together. I enjoyed hearing her laughter and was reminded of the many programs we have watched together. Along with the laughter and good times shared.

I remember when relatives and friends visited our parents told stories of their everyday life that would make many people throw in the towel and everyone would laugh so hard because they always made their life sound like a "I Love Lucy Show". There was always room for humor and time to laugh.

She was the one that had the huge Christmas dinners that were shared with Grandparents, Aunts, Uncles and cousins. She was a doer and didn't always sugar coat everything but almost everything she did showed she cared. It wasn't always with words but more often by actions taken.

So many stories. So Sad. She will be missed!! Especially the Esther and Mom we knew before she got so sick.

Love, Diane

Below is daughter-in-law Gail Mesko Hertsel's Eulogy:

MOM

Esther Hertsel May 31, 1925 - October 23, 2007

    Most of you knew Esther and if you did not, you are here because she has touched your life by what she has instilled in maybe one of her children or grandchildren that you know.  I have learned so much from this lady.  So many people have issues and complaints regarding their mother-in-law.  NOT ME!  I vowed many times that if & when I became a mother- in-law, I would follow her example.  She has been a blessing in my life since the first day I met her.  I am married to her baby boy.  He was the last to leave her womb and the last to leave her nest.  Danny and his mom had a special bond.  They spent a great deal of time together.  They shared many evenings and many conversations about everything under the sun before he married and left home.  Often times mothers have a hard time giving up their sons to other women for a life-time.  Mom’s love multiplied rather than divided when I joined the family.  She always had a way of making me feel like her own.
    Mom was always a source of encouragement.  She took the lemons in life and made lemonade.  

On my wedding day when nothing seemed to be going right. I was crying because every thing was lost and not going according to plan. She said “one day you will look back and laugh about this”. She was right! The very thing I admired and treasure most about Mom was her ability to laugh at herself. Many, many times she faced challenges in her life and found ways to laugh about when all was said and done. Even after the stroke when she struggled with formulating words and could not get things to come out the way she meant, we would joke with her and she would laugh right along with us. There are a few stories that I have shared countless times and still get the giggles over every time I think of them.

    Many of the stories I think of would as Diane says made great “I love Lucy” episodes.  The Hertsels could have written their own show and called it “I love Esther”.  Danny remembered an episode that was not funny at the time but he and Mom laughed when it was resolved.  Again it involves Mom’s challenges in communication due to the stroke.  Danny was to stay at Sharon’s with Mom while Sharon and John were visiting John and Diane up North.  Danny went out to get the newspaper on this bitter cold Sunday morning and accidentally locked himself out and his Mom in the house.  The temperature was really cold and he of course had not put on a coat.   When Danny realized his dilemma he began to pound on the door like Fred Flintstone trying to get his Mom’s attention.  He could hear Mom from the bedroom yelling Danny, someone is at the door.  Danny hollered “Mom it’s me,  I am locked out!”  In desperation he tried coaching Mom to open the front door. After many attempts it was evident that Mom’s crippled hand could not accomplish this task.   From outside the door, he instructed her to telephone David.  She was able to reach David’s answering machine.  Whenever she got nervous it was harder for her to say what she meant.  The message left  was “Danny ------David is locked in the house----- come over!   David was quite confused and concerned when he later got that message. Mean while Danny is standing outside freezing his hind end off.  Next, Mom being the resourceful person she was, telephoned Diane’s house and let Sharon know what was happening.  Sharon was able to get hold of Johnnie who came over to rescue his uncle Danny with a key.  It was an hour and ½  later when David got the message and called Danny at Sharon’s.  When Danny answered David said , (and I will clean this up a bit) “YAH “WHAT IS GOING ON OVER THERE?”   All was well that ended well.   
    As Diane mentioned, Mom got excited with the birth of each grandchild.  Michael would have been

number 11. She could not wait for him to be born. At the time Danny was working in Elkhart and Mom & Dad lived in Elkhart as well. I was a week overdue. Danny was nervous with each passing day, wondering if he would be where he needed to be when the baby came. One day at the factory, Danny was called over the speaker, “ Dan Hertsel-----telephone---- line 1”. There was a hush over the whole factory while everyone anticipated. When he reached the phone the voice on the other end said, “Danny, it’s Mom, has Gail had that baby yet?” As if we would forget to call her. Michael was born at 8:42 on a Sunday evening. Soon afterwards Danny excitedly and dutifully called his folks to give the news of the arrival of their newest grandson. The next morning when Mom got to the hospital, she told Danny “The next time you guys have a baby, wait till morning to call me.” She was so excited that she could not sleep. We laughed. Then there was the time that she came down to help me get ready for the new baby, before Jeff was born. We were hanging blinds over the windows. I had sent Mom to get something out of the tool box that was stored in a closet. I had a cup of mothballs in there to deter mice. From the other side of the house, I heard Mom say, “Oh Mikey what do you have,---marshmallows?” In a panic, I got my very pregnant belly off from the ladder and went running through the house to save my 2 year old from poison. When I came around the corner, I discovered Mom spitting and sputtering and wiping her tongue. It was not my 2 year old, I needed to worry about. I laughed for days and still get the giggles every time I think about that site. She said it took days to get that moth ball taste out of her mouth.

    I will never cease to be amazed at how Mom managed to take care of those 4 babies that came so close together with no automatic washing machine or disposable diapers.  These 4 babies were born in a time span of 2 ½ years.  Mom was the queen of multi-tasking.  Sometimes she got so busy that consequences were suffered.  There are more stories that I love that involve these times of taking care of the little ones.  Once she was making an effort to brighten Sharon’s baby-shoe laces.   She left them soaking in bleach and got busy doing other things.  When she went to retrieve them---all that was left were the little plastic tips.  There was the time she decided to save time by allowing the twins to feed themselves their oatmeal in their high chairs while she waxed her bedroom floor. She described how she put socks on her hands and feet to be able to get the polishing done in half the time.  Can’t you just see Lucy doing this?  When she returned to check on them, she found that not a lot of oatmeal got in their tummies.  It seemed that everything in the kitchen was covered with slimy oatmeal including her two babies.  She cried the whole time she cleaned up the mess, exclaiming all the while, “ My mother always said ‘haste makes waste, haste makes waste.‘” On another one of her multitasking incidents, she was boiling undergarments on the stove to get them a brighter white. A little too much time had  passed when she smelled something burning.   This particular incident required her and dad to make an emergency trip to town.  These were lean times and it  was hard to make ends meet in those early days but there are many happy memories that have evolved for this family from those years.  I remember hearing of  trips to the Drive -In-Theater when Mom and Dad would pack the car with pop-corn and the leaf from the dining room table which they would lay across the back seat between the arm rests on the doors so that those 4 little ones could see the movie.  Often, Mom and Dad would fall asleep before the second feature. 
     There is another story regarding a particular baby that also gives me the giggles.  Mom had  developed what she thought was a bad kidney infection.  She finally went to the doctor to get some medicine.  The doctor said to her “Esther, you will feel fine in about 7 or 8 months.  With much alarm, she said “You mean I have to put up with this Kidney infection for 8 months?”  He said “Esther, this is no kidney infection, you are going to have another baby“.  Her comment was “What am I going to tell my husband?”   I guess a number 6 had not been scheduled.  I sure am glad for that kidney infection that turned out to be my husband.  I know  Mom, Dad & everyone else was too.  
    It was not many months after the delivery of this surprise that Mom and Dad faced some of their biggest challenges in their married life.  Dad became very ill with Rheumatic Fever.  He ended up at the V.A. Hospital in Fort Wayne Indiana.  It was a very long road to recovery.  Mom was forced to put her baby boy in the care of her sister while she went to work to keep a roof over the family’s heads.  She worked as a nurse’s aide at the Cass County Medical Care Facility.  Mom was good at taking care of people.   She took good care of Dad.  He recovered  and blessings were counted. 
    There were other opportunities for her to be an angel at someone’s bedside.  She cared for her sister-in-law, Margaret through an awful battle and death of cancer.  Mom always knew what to do and took matters into her own hands to provide the best care for whomever was in her charge.  I am sure her children still long for their mother when they are sick or don’t feel good.
    Mom was very resourceful.  She was the type of person you would want with you if you found yourself on a deserted island.   Often when we needed a solution to a problem, Danny would say “call my mom.”   She could figure out a way to accomplish any task that needed to be done. She was persistent and if the first several efforts did not pan out she would resort to plan B or C or D.  Whatever it took.  Giving up was not her nature. There are memories of her working on the Television set.   She would be using tools in the back while she had her make-up mirror in the front so she could see what was happening with the picture on the screen.  Mom was often the fix-it and maintenance woman around the house.  After her stroke when her body lost so much of it’s ability, she worked so hard to accomplish every day tasks with just one good hand which had not  formerly been her dominant.  I remember seeing her set her hair with rollers.  This is something I never figured out how to do with two good hands.  It was important to Mom to always keep herself looking nice even though many days she never left the house.  She always said inevitably the day she would choose to take her time and enjoy a cup of coffee with the Sears Catalog  in her nightgown, someone she had not seen in ages would drop in.  I think of Mom every time that happens to me.
    When her family was all still at home, Mom looked forward to the winter time when things would slow down and all of her family would be together in their cozy warm home, safe and sound for the evenings.  Many of these evenings involved dish-pans of popped corn and apples. 
    Mom will be remembered for how great she was in the kitchen.  Danny misses her Swiss Steak.  Diane was right about her pies.  My children loved the sugar cinnamon pies Grandma made out of the left-over pie dough.  My favorite was her home-made butterscotch pie,  She made the filling with lots of brown sugar and butter in an iron skillet.  She always had a huge, beautiful mound of meringue on top.

YUM YUM! Mom loved cooking for her family and it was a great challenge for her to learn to cook in smaller amounts when all of her 6 children grew up and left home. Our household benefited much from her left-overs.

    Mom did love to crochet too.  Our babies all had beautiful hats, sweaters, and booties made by Grandma.  One winter Mom nearly froze Dad and Danny and Sally out of the house.  She got involved in a big project of crocheting a cover for the couch.  She would get so hot while she had this massive cover on her lap and her crochet hook was madly eating up the yarn moving across rippled row after row.   She kept turning down the thermostat.  They were grateful when that project was finished.
     It has been so long since Mom could be her productive self and do all these thing.  She did not just do them.  She did them with joy and gusto.  I believe she is whole again.  Scripture promises there will be no more pain or suffering. I rejoice with Mom today because I know she has been given a new body.  A body that does not hurt and that can function fully.  When hearing the news of Grandma’s passing, Erin cried tears of loss and of joy.  She said, “Grandma can walk again”  Erin has no memory of Grandma walking.  She was just 11 months old that horrible night when a stroke took the use of Mom’s legs and most of the use of her right arm.  Mike and Jeff both commented that they knew Grandma was now walking the streets of gold with Grandpa.  I believe she is on her knees polishing those streets of gold.  She always liked cleaning and polishing and making things shiny. Maybe she has socks on her hands and feet.   I will miss her dearly and I will rejoice when I meet up with her again.
    I am now a mother-in-law of two beautiful and delightful young women.  I love them as my own daughters.  I hope they can think of me the way I thought of this wonderful lady who taught me so very much.    
    These are the stories and reminiscences that we often  talked about at our visits to the Nursing Home.  Mom enjoyed hearing them and sharing them over and over so I know she wont mind that I shared them with you today.  Not long ago I saw a phrase painted on a sign that I think describes Mom.  It said “Live Simply, Laugh Often and Love Deeply,”.

God Bless You Mom Peace and Joy be with you as you celebrate your new body and your new residence. Love Gail

MEMORIES OF MOM

THESE THINGS WILL NOT BE FORGOTTEN

In their reminiscing Sharon and Betty remember these things:

Mom & us looking at the Sears catalog. Playing Yatzee games. All the pop-corn on Sunday Nights. The PJs at Christmas and the traditional Vegetable soup on Christmas Eve. Making school clothes together.

There are memories of Sunday afternoon car rides/ Today’s radios and CD players or other electronics were not necessary. Mom & Dad entertained the kids by singing songs like “Red Red Robin,” “Chattanooga Choo Choo,” and “Someone’s in the kitchen with Dinah.”

No one in this family will be able to eat or even see a piece of orange slice candy without thinking of Mom. Hopefully it will be “fresh” the way she liked it.

Sally remembers being Mom’s side kick on all the home projects, like putting up the screens and storm doors. Mom was one that never could leave a project unfinished. Sometimes they worked so hard on one of her missions, Mom would get tired, and get the giggles. Sally would say “Oh Mom, You are so tired, let’s finish this tomorrow” That was not an option for Mom. The infectious giggling would continue and progress would be made until the task was finished. Mom worked so hard that often, in the evenings, she would fall to sleep while she relaxed in the evenings. Danny and Sally would poke and prod and harass her till she woke up. They would say ----“Mom you’re going to get a sore neck”, finally she would wake and say “Oh , was I sleeping”.

Danny and Sally hated those stormy school mornings when their overprotective mother would call a taxi to take them to school. “HOW EMBARASSING”

David says his absolute fondest memories of his mom are the times spent with her in the kitchen while she recreated the traditional recipes that had been made for generations in their family. David inherited his mother’s love for cooking. As a very small boy, he developed a great fascination for cooking. David watched intently and became his mother’s best student. She encouraged him and told him that it would be a good thing for him to learn to cook. He says he never did get the pie crust thing down. “That was way over his head.” I guess “Like Father Like Son,”. David still loves to cook the old traditional meals today but like his Mom, he likes to experiment with new recipes too.

He remembers laying on the living room floor in front of the T.V. while Mom would doze in her chair. Often he would tickle her feet till she woke and would say “Cut that Out!,” always with a grin . What is it with these Hertsel Kid that they would not let their poor mother rest?

David remembers too, the treats that Mom would send to Viet Nam---- the cookies and the fudge and other goodies. It was great to share these tastes of home with his army buddies. Once Mom sent a tin of Saltine crackers with the cheese that came in the squirt can. What a treat that was! It is always the simple things we miss and treasure the most, as it will be with our fondest memories of Mom.

Ralph and Esther Hertsel, Marjorie and Melvin Scott, at Sharon Smith's Home, Edwardsburg, MI 1990's

Esther Hertsel around 1990