.....A firm that represents tradition...

For more than 90 years, 127 S. Logan St. has been the address of a Lincoln funeral home.

John Boyden opened the first one there in 1893 and the residence is occupied today by Fricke-Calvert-Schrader Funeral Home.

The business has changed greatly since Boyden's day when funerals and wakes were often held in the homes of the deceased.  Boyden utilized a livery stable across the street to house horses and carriages that were part of the turn-of-the-century funeral business when funeral directors, instead of family members and friends did the traveling.

Lineage of the current ownership can be traced to 1952 when Armin and Vivian Fricke moved from Jacksonville to Lincoln to form a partnership with Herman Dammerman.  The business was known as Dammerman-Fricke Funeral Home until 1957 when it became Fricke Funeral Home.  A second home in Mt. Pulaski was also acquired.

Besides providing funeral and burial services, Fricke also provided ambulance service in the Lincoln and Mount Pulaski areas.  Most funeral homes in the county provided similar emergency vehicle service until a county-wide ambulance service was organized here in 1974.

The Fricke-Calvert-Schrader Funeral Home of Mt. Pulaski originated on October 31, 1935 by Wilbert H. Schahl, a licensed funeral director and embalmer.  Because funerals and night wakes (visitations) were held at family residences, Wilbert's rental of the Evans property at 107 North Vine Street, two doors north of the Methodist Church, became the first home used specifically for funerals.  Several years later he purchased Mrs. Carrie Zah Myers home for a Funeral Home where it is presently located.  In 1952, he added a chapel, office and an attached garage.  Wilbert's sister, Norma, served in the formative years as a secretary and lady attendant before becoming licensed in 1958.  She celebrated her 50th year of continued service on October 31, 1985.

The earliest record of an undertaker being in business in Mt. Pulaski is the 1860's when G.A. Robinson was in business.  Later, it became Clark and Gideon and on March 1, 1875, Rueben Hershey came to work for Mr. John Zimmerman, an undertaker and furniture maker.

The names of other undertakers that appeared to have been in business at the turn of the century, but could not be absolutely confirmed were:  Henry Williams Undertaker and Wallpaper Hanger, and later Snyder Undertaking and Wallpaper which was located in a store front on the south side of the square.

Sometime around 1918, Robert Sheets operated a funeral parlor in the third building south of the present City Clerk's office until about 1922.  The front part of his building was used for the city clerk's office.

Wilbert H. Schahl first worked for John Hershey until 1935, in the second building south of the present City Clerk's office (east side of Square).  John and his father, Reuben Hershey, dedicated a combined seventy years of service to the community as an undertaker and furniture dealer before selling his business to the Sheets Company (Marvin Hutchcraft) in 1945. 

After the death of Frank Pease, a funeral director in Latham, Wilbert had the Schahl Home for Funerals in Latham from 1949 until the time of his death in 1965.

In April of 1965, the Schahl Funeral Home was purchased by Armin and Vivian Fricke, both licensed funeral directors and owners of the Fricke Memorial Home in Lincoln.  In 1975, they changed the name to Fricke Funeral Home, Mt. Pulaski and Lincoln.

In January of 1981, the Frickes' son, Chuck, and his partners, Dennis R. Schrader and Larry Calvert, purchased the funeral home which is called the Fricke-Calvert-Schrader Funeral Home.  In 1983, Chuck became the youngest state president of the Illinois Funeral Directors Association.

(This article was written by the Lincoln Courier News Staff)