An Extraordinary Life: ‘She always did everything with a smile on her face’

If life circumstances were different, Clara Schultz of Joliet might have chosen a religious vocation.

That is the opinion of her niece, Nancy Voots of Minnesota due to Clara’s living faith.

“Her faith was just so important to her,” Nancy said.

Yes, Clara displayed religious pictures and figurines in her home, attended daily Mass and was a Eucharistic minister at Saint Paul the Apostle Church in Joliet, Nancy said.

But Clara also volunteered in the community, especially at Rialto Square Theatre in Joliet (Clara was named Volunteer of the Year in 2004) and the hospital known now at AMITA Health Saint Joseph Medical Center in Joliet.

Clara also showed people through her words and examples what a solid relationship with God looked like. Nancy and her husband Steve Voots saw this in their lives when Clara supported them as they raised two daughters with special needs: Jennifer Ann and Sarah Margaret (both deceased).

“She counted on her faith to get her through the difficult times,” Nancy said, “and to say, ‘thank you’ when good things happened.”

Clara was 88 when she died. Jan. 17.

Clara grew up on Maple Street in Joliet with her parents Art and Margaret and her brother, also Art (deceased), who served 29 years in the Joliet Police Department and 20 years as mayor of Joliet, his obituary said.

“My dad tended to be the social one,” Nancy said. “My aunt stayed behind the scenes doing her good deeds. She never bragged about anything. Half the time, I didn’t even know how many friends she had until I became the county clerk. People would come into the office all the time and said, ‘Oh, I know your aunt through the Rialto, through St. Joe’s.’”

Clara, who worked for Illinois Bell for 38 years, lived with her parents and took care of them for the rest of their lives, especially her mother who had dementia, Nancy said.

“There wasn’t any hospice back then, so Clara took care of her mother until she died,” Nancy said. “[my} Mom and Dad had five children and were busy raising us, so she had to take care of her mom. When she [Clara] ended up with the same thing, we were able to get hospice to help her, but Clara never had any of that.”

But Clara did take care of herself. She loved to swim, especially at the Greater Joliet YMCA and the Elks Lodge 296 in Joliet, Nancy and Steve said. Clara also loved to walk and happily helped both Art and Nancy by covering precincts when they were running for offices.

“She was always the fastest and way ahead of the group,” Nancy said.

Because Clara never had any children of her own, she doted on her nieces and nephews, Nancy said. She recalled Clara taking Nancy and Nancy’s siblings shopping in downtown Joliet and taking them on trips to Chicago, Nancy said. Clara had no favorites and made each child feel special, Nancy said.

Nancy stressed those shopping trips were for the nieces and nephews, not for Clara. Steve said Clara lived a simple life and didn’t like buying clothes for herself.

“She probably wore the same overcoat for 35 years,” Steve said.

Nancy added, “If we bought her new coats and hats, she’d end up taking everything back. She’d rather give to us and the community and she was very generous about donating to the church.”

Because she had nieces with special needs, Clara also donated to United Cerebral Palsy: Center for Disability Services in Joliet, Nancy said. Clara did buy a house on Dwight Street after he mother died, Nancy said.

But after her family, the most important living being in her life was her cat Tiger.

Steve said Clara had at least 10 cats, but just one at a time, and she had named each one of them “Tiger.” Steve said Clara did have one weakness. She loved Lladro porcelain figurines.

“It’s the one thing we can think of where she spent any money on herself,” Steve said. “One or twice a year she’d buy herself a new one and she’d be so proud of it, displaying it in her curio cabinet. But that was it. She never bought herself anything else in the entire time I knew her.”

Clara liked to wear stocking caps and she loved her shamrock scarf, Nancy said. Clara did make a trip to Ireland – one of the few times she rode a plane, Steve said – she braved the airplane a second time to attend the wedding of her great-nephew Max Voots, Nancy said.

Her favorite holiday was St. Patrick’s Day, and her signature greeting was, “How ya do?” Nancy said.

“She never complained about a thing,” Nancy wrote in the eulogy. “She always did everything with a smile on her face…she just had a good heart.”

In later years Clara also had dementia, Nancy said. Eventually Clara received care at Senior Star at Weber Place in Romeoville, where Clara thought she was an employee, Nancy said.

One of Nancy’s favorite pictures is that of Clara holding hands with another resident and leading that resident back to her room.

“Even when she had her own problems, she was still helping people on the dementia unit,” Nancy said.

But perhaps Nancy’s favorite memory of visiting Clara on the dementia unit was the walk they took on a sunny summer day to the nearby pond in the courtyard at Senior Star.

“There were ducks in the pond we sat there and watched them and walked around holding hands,” Nancy wrote in the eulogy. “Two months later when I went and saw her, she brought up that day we shared together by the pond and said how much she loved it. It made my heart so happy knowing, even with the dementia she had, she still remembered that day that we shared together, and what fun we had.”

• To feature someone in “An Extraordinary Life,” contact Denise M. Baran-Unland at 815-280-4122 or dunland@shawmedia.com.