Iona "Onie" Schmuck

Iona “Onie” Schmuck, 91, of Warsaw, passed away on Tuesday, April 12, 2022, at Odin Health Care Center in Odin, IL.  Iona was born on April 5, 1931, in Warsaw, IL, the daughter of Fred and Irene Schmuck. 

Iona was a lifelong resident of Warsaw and a member of the Trinity United Methodist Church.  She started her career at the Quincy Herald Whig as a route driver, that was a seven day a week job.  She would drive to the Herald Whig in Quincy, pick up the bundles of newspapers, and deliver to various locations throughout northern Adams county and Hancock county where the kids would collect their papers for delivery to customers.   Because of her dedication, she was promoted to district manager for west central Illinois and northeast Missouri, spending many hours on the road teaching and mentoring kids for paper routes.   Sometimes “Aunt Onie” would call in recruits, her nieces and nephews, to assist when one or more of the route carriers were absent.  She would usually offer bribes (ice cream, soda, candy) for help in running the route.  Looking back, there were great conversations between them as well as an understanding of how hard delivering papers really was. 

Aunt Onie was a kid at heart especially when it came to her nieces and nephews.  She was an avid gamer whether it was card games, Yahtzee, or Trivial Pursuit.  It was suspected that Aunt Onie would spend hours memorizing all the answers to Trivial Pursuit just so she could have the upper hand.  As a participant of these games, you could guarantee there would be competition but even more you could guarantee there would be lots of laughter.  In addition to games, Onie was an avid morel mushroom hunter waiting for spring and being able to brag that she found the first mushroom of the year.  During her mushroom hunting days, in any given year she would find several pounds of mushrooms, the majority of these were given to family and friends. 

Iona is survived by one sibling, Lucille Nimitz, along with many nieces, nephews and cousins.  She was preceded in death by her parents, and five siblings, Dorothy Lema, Myrta Mendonca, Florene Ruffcorn, A.J. Schmuck, and Wendell Schmuck.

Graveside services will be held at 1:15 pm on Saturday, April 23, 2022, at Oakland Cemetery in Warsaw, Illinois. A funeral procession to the cemetery will depart from Printy Funeral Home in Warsaw at 1 pm. Visitation will be held from noon to 1 pm on Saturday at Printy Funeral Home in Warsaw directly before the service.

Memorials may be directed to Trinity United Methodist Church in Warsaw.

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