Ila Wermuth, age 88, died peacefully at noon on Sunday, December 19, 2010 at the HospiceCare Center in Fitchburg, WI. She was born November 19, 1922 in LaRue, WI. She spent summers as a child assisting her grandparents at their boarding house in North Freedom. After high school, Ila worked as a telephone operator in Madison for many years. During her free time, Ila enjoyed roller skating and traveled to many area roller rinks with friends, even going as far as Chicago. She married Frank Wermuth on April 25, 1946 and then bowling became her sport. Ila and Frank farmed in Middleton from 1946 to 1964 on what was called the Rocky Knoll farm and then moved to Mazomanie and continued farming on a site now known as Brookside Gardens where they sold vegetables to Mazomanie area residents. To keep this prosperous farm running, they employed many of the local male hoodlums to keep them off the streets, by planting in the spring, picking berries and scrubbing squash, they learned the good values that Ila helped teach them. One of the boys even went on to become a New York police officer. While the boys worked the fields, Ila delivered the produce to many local stores in the Madison area. When the deliveries were complete, she enjoyed running the home vegetable stand, spending time with each customer and catching up on the news of the town. Ila did a lot of volunteer work with the local grade school, kept the books for the church, and was a driver and presenter for RSVP of Dane County. She enjoyed embroidery and she made a beautiful quilt. She was an avid reader, especially enjoying her books and word search puzzles when it became more difficult to get around. Ila's favorite saying in recent years was "the joys of growing older...see what you've got to look forward to..."


Survivors include her five children, Larry Wermuth of Belton, TX, Cathy (Dennis) Early of Thousand Oaks, CA, Janet (Doug) Allison of Hoffman Estates, IL,
Mary (Mike) Jastrzebski of Fort Lauderdale, FL, and Carla Tom) Wolf of New Glarus; a son-in-law, Mark Char) Pertzborn of Cross Plains; four grandchildren, Tom (Abby Mortimore) Pertzborn, Marci (Colin) Hughes, Joshua and Hannah Wolf; three great-grandchildren, Liam, Owen and Braeden Hughes; a sister, Janice (Ed) Niebuhr of Waunakee; other relatives and friends. She was preceded in death by her parents, William and Etha (Young) Polglase; her husband Frank; a daughter, Marilyn; and brothers and sisters.


A Mass of Christian Burial will be held at 11:00 a.m. on Thursday, December 23, 2010 at St. Barnabas Catholic Church, Mazomanie, with Fr. Faustino Ruiz officiating. Burial will follow in St. Barnabas Cemetery. Friends may call from 9:00 until 10:45 a.m. on Thursday at Hooverson Funeral Home, 702 Emily Rd., Mazomanie.

In lieu of flowers, memorials are preferred for N.W. Dane Senior Center or HospiceCare Inc.