Merrill Lee HACKBARTH

HACKBARTH, DUSENBERG, HORN, OHMART, HOLMES, DAVIES

Posted By: Sarah Thorson Little (email)
Date: 3/30/2008 at 10:06:41

CLEAR LAKE - Merrill Lee Hackbarth, 78, died Saturday (Oct. 14, 2000) at Muse-Norris Hospice Inpatient Center, Mason City. Funeral services will be held at 10 a.m. Tuesday at Ward-Van Slyke Funeral Home, 101 N. Fourth St., Clear Lake. Interment will be at Coulter Cemetery. Visitation will be held from 5 to 7 p.m. today at Ward-Van Slyke Funeral Home.

Merrill Lee Hackbarth was born Jan. 15, 1922, at Fort Dodge, the son of Lee and Esther (Duesenberg) Hackbarth. When he was 6 months old the family moved to Wellsburg where they resided for 13 years. In 1935 the family moved to Dows where Merrill graduated from high school in 1939. Merrill enlisted in the U. S. Coast Guard on Nov. 5, 1942, during World War II. He served as a gunners mate 2/class aboard a Coast Guard cutter which patrolled the Atlantic Ocean for German submarines. During the spring of 1945 the cutter was transferred to the central Pacific where Merrill saw action against the Japanese during the fierce air and sea battle at Okinawa. He received his honorable discharge in March of 1946. He had enrolled at Iowa State University in Ames prior to enlisting in the Coast Guard and now returned to earn a bachelor's degree in agricultural economics. While attending Iowa State, Merrill became a member of the Alpha Gamma Rho fraternity.

Merrill married Pauline (Polly) Horn on July 23, 1947, at the Nazareth Lutheran Church in Coulter. He became General Manager of the Osage Coop Elevator at Osage in 1950. While living at Osage he was a member of the Osage Rotary Club and the American Legion and served as a trustee of our Savior's Lutheran Church. In 1958 he became General Manager of the Sanborn Co-op Grain Co., at Sanborn. Merrill became account executive with T. C. Henderson & Co. of Des Moines in 1965 at their Mason City office. He and his wife and their two children moved to Clear Lake. When Piper, Jaffray & Hopwood of Minneapolis purchased Henderson's in 1970, he remained in the same position in the same office. He worked as a commodity and stockbroker for 25 years before retiring in 1990. After working with markets and marketing most of his adult life, Merrill continued to follow and study markets throughout his retirement. He was an avid sports fan and never grew tried of listening to big band music. He and his wife, Polly, also enjoyed traveling and their travels covered every state in the lower 48.

Merrill is survived by his wife, Pauline of Clear Lake; a daughter, Laurie Ohmart and her husband, Tom, of West Des Moines; a son, Hal and his wife, Lori Hackbarth, of Clear Lake; two sisters, Leola Holmes of Dows and Mavis Davies of St. Louis, Mo.; one granddaughter, Olivia Hope Hackbarth of Clear Lake; and several nieces and nephews. Ward-Van Slyke Colonial Funeral Home

Mason City Globe-Gazette
October 16, 2000