A couple who have lived in Hickory Corners for most of their nine decades will ride in style Sept. 2 as grand marshals of the 2024 Suring Labor Day Parade.
Robert and Pat Broetzman, ages 91 and 90, respectively, met at Hickory Grade School in seventh and eighth grade.
“Love at first sight!” Pat said in a biography that she provided for this article.
They will celebrate their 74th wedding anniversary in November, a partnership that produced two children — Dennis Broetzman and Vicky Garland — five grandchildren and seven great-grandchildren to date.
The 94th annual Suring Labor Day Celebration is scheduled Aug. 30 to Sept. 2. The parade at 10 a.m. Sept. 2 is the centerpiece of the weekend-long festival based at Veterans Memorial Park, which also includes tractor pulls and a demolition derby, a library book sale, chili cook-off, the Suring Homecoming Dinner and Sunday night fireworks.
Robert Broetzman was born on a farm west of Hickory on Hickory Cemetery Road, which is well known for the round barn that his grandfather built. At age 8, the family moved to Hickory Corners, where his father purchased the Shell gas station. The youngster pumped gas for 18 cents a gallon, washed windshields and checked the oil, all included in the price.
After grade school, he attended Oconto Falls High School and Northeast Wisconsin Technical College, where he received a millwright degree and a master plumber’s license. He retired from Scott Paper Co. after 28 years and also owned an excavating and septic system business until his retirement.
He loved collecting gas station memorabilia and purchased the property at the corner of County Roads M and G with its century-old Mobil station, which he restored. It is featured in the book “Fill ’Er Up: The Glory Days of Wisconsin Gas Station.”
Born to Gust and Pearl Broetzman in 1933, Robert inherited the title “Mayor of Hickory” from his father. An avid hunter and fisherman, he shot a trophy caribou in Alaska and a trophy cougar at a special hunt in Nevada that received a bronze award in 2002. Both hunting trips were with his son, Dennis.
Pat was born in Kaukauna in 1934 to Arthur and Naomi Graf. The family moved north when she was 8. After meeting her lifetime companion at Hickory Grade School, she attended Oconto Falls and Suring high schools, spending 28 years working at Oconto Falls Community Memorial Hospital and in medical clinics.
She was involved in 4-H with their children and was a past president of the hospital auxiliary. She volunteered at the hospital after retiring, then caught the business bug from her husband and opened Pat’s Part of the Past Antique Shoppe in the former one-room schoolhouse where the couple met.
Pat spends time in the garden with her flowers and still loves “golfing with the ladies” at age 90. Both are active members of the Suring Area Historical Society and have been members of Hickory Methodist Church for 66 years.
“The Lord has been good to us,” they said. “We are honored to represent the Town of Maple Valley and Suring in the 2024 Labor Day Parade.”
The Broetzmans have seen their share of change over the years. Dirt roads gained gravel and then blacktop, indoor plumbing replaced outhouses, wall telephones became cellphones, and typewriters evolved into home computers.
“We had the first television, but no signal until two years later,” Pat said. “We built the first mini-warehouses in the county.”
In addition to serving as Maple Valley parade marshals, the Broetzmans will be honored in a ceremony at the park afterward along with Al De Puydt, the Suring Citizen of the Year.
Broetzmans named parade marshals
