Aunt of Blackhawks' Chariman Wirtz dies
The Chicago Blackhawks may have been a family businesses, but the love of hockey was personal for Sunny Ann Wirtz.
"Even though she wasn't well the past six months, she made sure she got to the hockey game come hell or high water," said Angelo Creticos, one of the team's former examining physicians and a colleague of Wirtz for more than 40 years.
Sunny Wirtz, the wife of the late Arthur M. Wirtz Jr., died Sunday from complications of cancer. She was 70. She was the aunt of current Blackhawks Chairman Rocky Wirtz.
The ties to hockey ran deep for Sunny Wirtz. The romance with Arthur began in March 1962, when the Hawks, one of the six original National Hockey League teams, played the Montreal Canadiens in the Stanley Cup semifinals. Both their parents lived in the same building in Chicago.
The families had traveled together to Montreal, and after one of the games, one relative playfully asked Arthur to take Sunny out to dinner.
"They kept dating and were married in August of that year," said her daughter, Laura Jenkins.
The hockey team became an extended family for Sunny and Arthur, Jenkins said. The marquee names were more than just players to watch on the ice.
"When I was a little kid, they had that relationship with the players. They were friends," according to Jenkins.
A native of Wisconsin, Sunny Wirtz also was a fan of the Green Bay Packers and loved to fish, be it in the North Woods of Wisconsin or the Bahamas.
"She was a very strong woman, very tough," Jenkins said.
Sports were not her only interest.
She was active in fundraising for the former Henrotin Hospital, and when it was sold in the mid-1980s, she became a board member of the Washington Square Health Foundation Inc. The private foundation makes grants for medical and nursing education, medical research and health care services.
Sunny Wirtz remained an extremely active member and served as vice president before resigning about six months ago.
"She really cared about other people. There wasn't anything in it for her other than the gratification of doing something good," said Howard Nochumson, executive director.
Creticos, president of the foundation, said Wirtz was passionate about the Chicago Diabetes Project, a research effort in conjunction with the University of Illinois to develop a functional cure for the disease.
"That was a favorite project of hers," he said.
Creticos said he and Wirtz had been "wheelchair buddies" at Hawks games. At a game in January, she surprised him with a cake and about 75 friends for a birthday celebration.
"We were real friends," said Creticos, a cardiologist and internist who had treated her and other family members.
Besides Jenkins, she is survived by two sons, Arthur M. III and James; four grandchildren; a brother, David Soldwedel, and sister, Sue Wollin; sister-in-law Elizabeth Wirtz; and many nieces and nephews.
Visitation is from 4 to 8 p.m. Thursday at Donnellan Family Funeral Home in Skokie. The funeral is at 10 a.m. Friday at the Fourth Presbyterian Church in Chicago with interment at Ivanhoe Cemetery in Ivanhoe.
Instead of flowers, memorials can be made to the American Cancer Society, 820 Davis St., Suite 400, Evanston, IL 60201.