MARSHFIELD, WI (WSAU) — Marshfield will pay tribute and say farewell to former mayor Marilyn Hardacre this weekend.
Mayor Bob McManus has ordered flags in the city to fly at half-mast through the weekend, and there’ll be a church service on Saturday for the city’s first, and only, ‘lady mayor’ who died last Friday at the age of 84.
Former WDLB Radio news director Thom Gerretsen covered Hardacre’s tenure at City Hall from 1978 through 1986, and says her determination drove some of Marshfield’s biggest projects.
“I think of the boulevard. ‘Let’s do the crosstown boulevard!’ And that’s what it was called,” Gerretsen explained. “The boulevard or the near-east boulevard. It’s called Veterans Parkway now.”
“She was determined to get her agenda through, Gerretsen recalled. “She had the passion, but she also had the humanity. And she had class, dignity, and decency.”
Besides her four terms as mayor, Hardacre served as director of the Marshfield Area Chamber of Commerce and Industry until 1997, and served on numerous other local, regional, and statewide committees.
She was also the first female president of the League of Wisconsin Municipalities, and was influential in making Highway 10 a four-lane divided highway from Marshfield to the Fox Cities.
According to Gerretsen, “She was the type of official you want in city government as much as anyone, because she talked about her dreams, she talked about her ideas. When she was frustrated with things, she would mention that too.”
The memorial service for Marilyn Hardacre will be held at 11:00 Saturday morning at Zion Methodist Church in Marshfield. Friends may call at the Hansen-Schilling Funeral Home on Friday from 4 to 7 p.m., and at the church on Saturday morning beginning at 10:00.
