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1
HOUSE RESOLUTION

 
2    WHEREAS, The members of the Illinois House of
3Representatives wish to congratulate Marjorie Grandstaff of
4Yorkville on the occasion of her 100th birthday; and
 
5    WHEREAS, Marjorie Grandstaff was born on her family's farm
6in southwest Wisconsin on an unseasonably warm and sunny
7December 1st of 1923; she was the third child of Harry and
8Lelia Harris; and
 
9    WHEREAS, Marjorie Grandstaff, her two sisters, and her
10three brothers grew up during the Great Depression; this
11experience shaped her life in countless ways; she has many
12loving memories of her childhood home despite the struggles
13her family endured; she, along with her brothers and sisters,
14attended a one-room schoolhouse; and
 
15    WHEREAS, Marjorie Grandstaff met Loren Grandstaff, who was
16home on leave from the Army, when she was 17 at a dance in
17Soldiers Grove, Wisconsin; they were married several weeks
18later in Waukon, Iowa on November 2, 1941; she returned to Fort
19Lewis in Washington, and just as she was making plans to join
20him, word came of the bombing of Pearl Harbor and of the
21country being at war; and
 

 

 

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1    WHEREAS, Marjorie Grandstaff did not see Loren again for
2three years, as he was shipped overseas; during the war, she
3worked stamping bombs at a munitions factory in Rockford; she
4later moved to Denver, Colorado to be near her brother,
5Bueford, who was in the Army and stationed nearby; she worked
6there a year before returning to Chicago on the Zephyr train,
7which was famous at the time for its high rate of speed, which
8was 90 mph; and
 
9    WHEREAS, After the war, Marjorie Grandstaff and Loren
10farmed in southwest Wisconsin, where they raised their three
11daughters, Cheryl, Dixie, and Jeanie; she planted a large
12garden every year and canned all kinds of vegetables and
13fruit; she was a wonderful seamstress and sewed most of her
14girls' clothes; she has always been a wonderful cook, and her
15daughters still remember their mom always having a special
16treat for them every day when they got home from school; and
 
17    WHEREAS, Marjorie Grandstaff's family relocated to Racine,
18Wisconsin in the early 1960s, where they lived until Loren's
19passing in 1993, after more than 52 years of marriage; she
20moved to Yorkville to be near her daughter, Dixie, in 2008 and
21lived independently until her move to Heritage Woods in 2016;
22and
 
23    WHEREAS, Marjorie Grandstaff has nine grandchildren and

 

 

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1nine great-grandchildren in addition to her three daughters;
2she has had 100 years of a simple and beautiful life and is
3cherished by her family and many friends; therefore, be it
 
4    RESOLVED, BY THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES OF THE ONE
5HUNDRED THIRD GENERAL ASSEMBLY OF THE STATE OF ILLINOIS, that
6we congratulate Marjorie Grandstaff on this historic occasion
7and wish her the best 100th birthday celebration; and be it
8further
 
9    RESOLVED, That a suitable copy of this resolution be
10presented to Majorie Grandstaff as a symbol of our respect and
11esteem.