Elgin undertaker committed to profession and to people

There were two sides to Ted Wachholz, the man who for 40 years owned Ted's Funeral Service in Elgin.

He was the consummate professional who once left a family vacation early and drove six hours from Wisconsin to Illinois because duty called.

Mr. Wachholz also exhibited a youthful spirit by playing practical jokes on friends he ran into at grocery stores by slipping random items into their shopping carts, then waiting for their reactions at the checkout line, said his son Ted Wachholz Jr.

Mr. Wachholz, who lived in Elgin for 40 years and spent the past nine living in Arlington Heights, died Friday. He was 82 years old.

It was a severe baseball injury that charted his course into the mortuary business.

Mr. Wachholz graduated from Dundee High School and was studying medicine at Valparaiso University when he was struck in the left temple by a baseball during a charity game. He was struck with such force that he was put into a coma.

When he recovered, he switched his study to embalming because his injury resulted in frequent seizures that would have impeded a medical career, his son said.

Mr. Wachholz graduated in 1949 from Worsham Mortuary College in Wheeling.

In 1951, he married Louise Erma Ebel.

Mr. Wachholz owned and was the sole employee of Ted's Funeral Service, which he ran from 1957 until he retired in the late 1990s.

Mr. Wachholz was a freelance mortician and as such was frequently in demand at funeral homes all across the Chicago region.

They called on him to do everything from embalming and preparing bodies for services to driving in funeral processions, his son said.

"From A to Z when it comes to the funeral business, outside of having your own funeral home, he did it all," his son said.

Steve Laird, one of the owners of the Laird and Wait Ross Allanson funeral homes in Elgin, knew Mr. Wachholz professionally for 30 years and said he took his duties very seriously.

"He was always a nice and very caring guy," Laird said. "It was very important for him to treat everyone with courtesy and respect and he did that very well."

When it came to personal attention, it didn't matter who you were, whether you were the paper boy who delivered his newspaper, the mail carrier who delivered his mail or the gas station attendant filling up his car.

Mr. Wachholz always took care to learn everyone's name, his son said.

If it wasn't visible on their nametags, he'd ask people what their names were and call them by it every time he saw them, his son said.

It was a small thing, but a simple action that brought cheer to many people's lives, his son said.

"I can pretty much guarantee they know who he is too, only because he'd take the effort to get their name and brighten their day," he said.

Mr. Wachholz was known as a jokester well into his 80s, his son said.

With his grandchildren and great-grandchildren, he acted like a child as well, putting on silly sunglasses, wearing lipstick and blatantly cheating at board games to make everyone laugh, his son said.

At the Luther Village retirement community in Arlington Heights, he frequently held court in the cafeteria where he told jokes that put everyone in stitches.

"The café will undoubtedly be much quieter now that Dad is gone," the younger Wachholz said.

Survivors include in addition to his son, his wife, Louise, his daughter, Joan Leatherman, 10 grandchildren and two great-grandchildren.

Funeral services have been held.