Wheeling remembers farmer, former trustee Mike Horcher

A former Wheeling trustee and patriarch of a local farming family has died.

Mike Horcher — father of current Wheeling Village President Pat Horcher — died March 16. He was 89.

Horcher was a fourth-generation farmer, part of an operation that dates to 1848. The Horcher Farm is the last remaining farm in Wheeling, village officials said in a news release.

Horcher was born in Iowa, where his mother’s family lived, but he grew up on the family farm in Wheeling, son Pat Horcher said.

A child of the Great Depression, the Horcher home didn't have plumbing or electricity until Mike was an adolescent.

“(He) had the experiences that nobody gets today,” Pat Horcher said. “Imagine life without a refrigerator.”

After graduating from the now-closed Arlington High School, Horcher served in the U.S. Army, primarily at a domestic Nike missile site. He married the former Bernadine “Bernie” Seidl, and together they raised six sons; a daughter, Gina, died in infancy.

Horcher worked the farm — initially with horse-drawn equipment — with his father and then with his sons, raising dairy and beef cattle, pigs and chickens. The family also grew grains for the livestock until transitioning to vegetable production in the 1970s. The Horchers sold produce at farmers’ markets and established Horchers Country Flowers, still operating on McHenry Road in Wheeling.

Horcher had other jobs in addition to farming, including construction and factory work. He helped build the house in which he lived as an adult, Pat Horcher said.

The elder Horcher also worked at Ekco-Alcoa Container in Wheeling, and Allis-Chalmers Manufacturing and Fiat-Allis Construction Machinery in Deerfield.

Horcher served two terms as village trustee, from 2001 to 2009, and was a Cook County Farm Bureau board member for 28 years.

As a village trustee, Horcher was “a consistent voice on behalf of Wheeling residents and businesses, particularly those in formerly unincorporated areas annexed by the village,” according to the village’s news release.

“Mike Horcher was steadfast in his principles and deeply committed to the good of the Wheeling community,” Village Manager Jon Sfondilis said in the release. “His wisdom and candor were greatly valued and will be greatly missed.”

Horcher’s survivors include his wife, their sons, grandchildren and great-grandchildren.

Visitation is scheduled from 2 to 7 p.m. Sunday at Glueckert Funeral Home, 1520 N. Arlington Heights Road, Arlington Heights. A funeral is set for 11 a.m. Monday at Horchers Farm, 910 McHenry Road, Wheeling.

Interment will follow at St. Mary Parish Cemetery, 10 N. Buffalo Grove Road, Buffalo Grove.