ROCHELLE – Wayne Edward Hardy, 91, of rural Lee, passed away Saturday, Aug. 14 at the DeKalb County Rehabilitation and Nursing Center in DeKalb.

Wayne was born on Dec. 20, 1929, in Waterman, Illinois.He was the only child of Holland William and Ruth (Colby) Hardy. He attended a rural Scarboro one-room school and graduated from Steward High School. He married Doris Marie Furman on Sept. 23, 1950 in Rochelle. They had three children.  

Wayne was a lifelong, third-generation grain and cattle farmer on the Byrd/Hardy farm in rural Lee. When he wasn’t farming, he worked for the township clearing snow and maintaining the roads, dabbled in real estate sales and assisted at Wrigley’s Garage in Lee to keep all the local vehicles in good shape. In addition to this, he had many interests throughout life, including raising Shetland ponies, go-karting, snowmobiling, maintaining and restoring many original tractors purchased by he and his father, participating in organized rural tractor drives, bringing wooden furniture back to life and attending county fairs where his grandchildren showed champion steers, heifers and chickens.  

He looked forward to weekend getaways, especially the annual Monroe Cheese Days, July 4 festivals and fireworks and country music. In between all his activities, he always made time to read – books, daily newspapers, National Geographic and Ag publications.       

Socializing at the local breakfast café most mornings and one of the various beverage establishments most afternoons for the latest news and updates were daily habits.  For those who knew him, you would always see him with a toothpick behind his ear and wearing one of his caps from his collection of over 300.

Even though he was an only child, he easily blended into and valued his large family-in-law that came as a package deal since Doris was one of 10 children. He was surrounded with the greatest food during the many gatherings, competitive card games and plenty of kindness. Wayne was a cancer survivor after successful treatment when he was 65.  

Wayne is survived by his wife of 70 years, Doris, of rural Lee; three children: Terry (Lisa) Hardy of Davis Junction, Nancy (Jeff) Lang, of Geneseo and Carol Hardy of Jacksonville Beach, Florida; four grandchildren:  Allen (Kelly) Hardy of Princeton, Nola (Phil) Eatherton of Peshtigo, Wisconsin, Amber (Erik) Bolander of Genoa and Colby Lang of Davenport, Iowa and six great grandchildren: Grant and Heath Hardy, Jack and Luke Eatherton and Briar and Brynn Bolander. Family would like to thank all the care givers at the DeKalb Rehab for their wonderful care of Wayne.

Visitation will be from 4-7 p.m. on Friday, Aug. 20 at the Unger-Horner Funeral Home, 400 N. 6th St. in Rochelle. Family request that all attendees wear masks please.

Private family graveside service will be on Saturday at Twin Grove Cemetery with Reverend Ken Foster officiating. The service will be available on the Unger-Horner Funeral Home Facebook page. In lieu of flowers, contributions in Wayne’s memory may be directed to St. Paul Lutheran School. Cremation care has been provided by the Unger-Horner Funeral Home. Please visit www.ungerhorner.com to sign the online guest book.