On behalf of the Bernbrock family,
I want to thank you all for being here today. Madge always made people
feel cared about, and it's a fitting tribute to my 
remarkable
grandmother to see so many people who cared deeply for her.
When I was young, I naturally looked up to the adults in my life, and thought the world revolved around them. Grandma Madge's genius was in making me believe the world revolved around me. Even more a stroke of genius on her part was that my five brothers and sisters and five cousins all believed the same thing.
Grandma made people feel special. She asked how school was going, and not only stayed around to hear the answer, but seemed genuinely interested in talking it over. She listened to us play the piano, the violin, the guitar, the recorder and the clarinet, and always proclaimed it the most beautiful music she's ever heard. Just for suffering kindly through all that cacaphony, Grandma, you deserve your own special place in heaven. Once, when I was getting on a plane to spend a year abroad, Grandma was there at the airport, having driven three hours with Grandpa at the crack of dawn to wish me well.
All of us grandchildren remember another way in which Grandma famously went above and beyond the call of duty--as houseguests, we count on waking up to presents at the foot of our bed each morning. We also awoke to the excitement of spending the whole day with this magical woman who took us to Whitey's and to zoos and the the Arsenal to swim. Grandma once bought a car when I was with her and named it after me. I was thrilled. No one had ever named a car after me before. True to form, Grandma never failed to refer to it by name in my presence. And we all knew we were in the presence of someone truly extraordinary when we could break a piece of crystal and hear those amazing three words, "slips don't count".
But we loved Madge, and shall always love her, not just for what she did for us, but for who she was. Charming, generous and elegant. Madge was an inimitable woman. She was stylish and witty and Irish, and no one else was lucky enough to have a grandma like her. One of my high school friends fondly remembers Grandma as "regal". I do think of Madge as part Grace Kelly, part Auntie Mame--a Villa girl, a lively conversationalist, a hostess par excellence, always ready to cheer one up and look on the bright side--and darned if she didn't look like a million bucks while doing it.
Grandma devoted her life to her family and to their educatiion and adventures and successes. We, in turn, Madge, will forever be devoted to you. You graced our lives with your smiling eyes, and you've left us all too suddenly. Among your many fine qualities, perhaps what we shall miss most of all is how you made us feel more loved than anyone has a right to feel.
And now, keeping in mind how Madge could lighten our spirits and brighten any occasion, I'd like to invite you all, on behalf of the Bernbrock family, to a reception following the cemetary service, in the Gold Room at the President's Casino--Blackhawk Hotel, on 3rd Street in Davenport.
Thank you,
Stephen Reidy
