Full Text of HR0368 099th General Assembly
HR0368 99TH GENERAL ASSEMBLY |
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| 1 | | HOUSE RESOLUTION
| 2 | | WHEREAS, In 1946, an Iowa teenager, Verlyn R. "Swede" | 3 | | Roskam, saw firsthand how the world looks
when a man shares his | 4 | | strength and his emptiness with something greater than himself; | 5 | | and
| 6 | | WHEREAS, In that year, Swede Roskam, who had been attending | 7 | | a private Midwestern residential school
- Wentworth Military | 8 | | Academy - learned that he would have to depart from the academy | 9 | | due to unfortunate circumstances; and
| 10 | | WHEREAS, Caught in the madness of World War II, another | 11 | | Wentworth graduate had never come home;
the family of this | 12 | | unknown American hero, with a name lost to history, stepped | 13 | | forward to underwrite
Swede's final year at Wentworth with the | 14 | | faith that this promising young man would pay forward the
| 15 | | message he had heard; and | 16 | | WHEREAS, Swede Roskam progressed from Wentworth to Knox | 17 | | College, graduating in 1951, and from there to an even
greater | 18 | | achievement, the love and hand of his lifelong partner, Martha | 19 | | Jacobsen Roskam; and | 20 | | WHEREAS, In the upsurge of creativity that came after World | 21 | | War II, Midwestern businessmen
discovered how to use the |
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| 1 | | chemical bonds found in clay minerals to create a wide variety | 2 | | of useful
products; as an executive salesman for Oil-Ori | 3 | | Corporation of America, Swede Roskam was able to
share new | 4 | | absorbent products with buyers around the world; and | 5 | | WHEREAS, Throughout his business career, Swede Roskam was a | 6 | | loving parent to his 5 children,
Stephen, Dick, Sarah, Peter, | 7 | | and Maribeth, and he was an upstanding and generous member of | 8 | | his church; and | 9 | | WHEREAS, As his business career ripened and matured, Swede | 10 | | Roskam realized that the time
had come when he could intensify | 11 | | the ability to work through the world to fill the emptiness of | 12 | | others;
in 1982, aware that some private business firms were | 13 | | disposing of excess inventory made redundant by
harsh economic | 14 | | conditions, he determined to create a matchmaking network in | 15 | | which useful private sector
inventory resources could be | 16 | | donated, on a tax-advantaged basis, to post-secondary | 17 | | institutions
of higher education on condition that the schools | 18 | | grant scholarships commensurate with the value of
the | 19 | | donations; and | 20 | | WHEREAS, This win-win organizational insight, initially | 21 | | implemented with the help of Illinois distribution
firm W.W. | 22 | | Grainger, generated Educational Assistance Ltd., the | 23 | | nationwide helping organization that has
played a role in the |
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| 1 | | granting of aid to more than 10,000 students across America; | 2 | | and | 3 | | WHEREAS, Continuing their business work, Swede and Martha | 4 | | Roskam opened new markets for
American-invented products in Ho | 5 | | Chi Minh City, the former Saigon; and | 6 | | WHEREAS, In 2002, Martha saw a
basketful of military dog | 7 | | tags that were being sold as war memorabilia; Swede"and Martha | 8 | | impulsively bought the entire basket, making it the foundation | 9 | | of the
Roskam Dog Tags Project, Martha's and Swede's more than | 10 | | 5-year-long project to track down and
return the tags to the | 11 | | veterans or their surviving families; and | 12 | | WHEREAS, Swede Roskam was more than qualified to help | 13 | | Martha support his fellow American
veterans, having served - as | 14 | | a young college graduate - as a company commander in the Korean | 15 | | War; and | 16 | | WHEREAS, Although Swede Roskam was repeatedly honored by | 17 | | the Republic of Korea, his fellow
veterans, his company, and | 18 | | his church, he repeatedly denied any claim to special pride or | 19 | | honors,
pointing to the support he had been given by special | 20 | | people throughout the years and the need for him
to pay it | 21 | | back; and
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| 1 | | WHEREAS, Swede Roskam further felt that although he had | 2 | | been blessed with an abundant life, far
more important as a | 3 | | blessing were the lives of his 5 children and their spouses, of | 4 | | Illinois, Indiana,
Pennsylvania, and Washington, and their 17 | 5 | | grandchildren; and
| 6 | | WHEREAS, Swede's son, Congressman Peter Roskam of | 7 | | Illinois' 6th District, recalls his father's words
that "Life | 8 | | is choices - make good choices"; and
| 9 | | WHEREAS, Peter Roskam has testified that Swede Roskam | 10 | | "lived an abundant life. His love for God
was the foundation | 11 | | upon which his life was built"; therefore, be it
| 12 | | RESOLVED, BY THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES OF THE | 13 | | NINETY-NINTH GENERAL ASSEMBLY OF THE STATE OF ILLINOIS, that we | 14 | | mourn the death of Verlyn "Swede" Roskam of Wheaton, Illinois, | 15 | | a Christian man, and an American; and be it further
| 16 | | RESOLVED, That suitable copies of this resolution should be | 17 | | presented to Verlyn R. "Swede" Roskam's wife, Martha Jacobsen | 18 | | Roskam; to his son and daughter-in-law, Stephen and Chandler | 19 | | Roskam, of Oak Park; to his son and daughter-in-law, Dick and | 20 | | Phyllis Roskam, of Indianapolis, Indiana; to his daughter, | 21 | | Sarah
Roskam, of Seattle, Washington; to his son and | 22 | | daughter-in-law, Peter and Elizabeth Roskam, of Wheaton;
and to |
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| 1 | | his daughter and son-in-law, Maribeth and Jon Coote of | 2 | | Rogersville, Pennsylvania.
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