A. E. Funk Obituary

Judge A. E. Funk yields to the Grim Reaper.

The people of Bullitt County were shocked last Wednesday morning when the sad intelligence was flashed over the telephone wires that Judge A. E. Funk was dead at his home at Brooks Station. He died in the early morning hours after an illness of about two weeks. His trouble was heart disease and acute dysentery. Thursday, his mortal remains were borne to Hebron Cemetery and interred there after brief service at the home conducted by Revs. Thorpe and Lloyd.

Judge Funk was born in Bullitt County on the 14th day of June, 1859, and was at the time of his death, fifty nine years, three months and eight days old. He was a son of Robert Funk and spent his early life near Mt. Olivet. He was educated in the common school of Bullitt County and Bardstown, and was a man of splendid educational accomplishments. In 1894, he was elected as magistrate in the Shepherdsville district and served with distinguished ability. In 1913, he was elected Judge of the Bullitt County Court and served four years in that honorable and responsible position, filling it with ability and retiring from it with an unsullied reputation.

Judge Funk was twice married. His first wife was Miss Victoria Holsclaw, daughter of the late William Hardin Holsclaw. Two children were born to that union, Mrs. Edith Gober and Mrs. Irving Sanders. Some years after the death of his first wife, he was married to Miss Eugenia Holsclaw, sister of his first wife. He is survived by his wife, seven daughters, Mesdames Edith Gober, Ora Sanders, Ernestine Atterbury and Cecil Queenbury, Misses Verna, Clara Linn and Ursa Funk, and Messrs A. E. Funk Jr, William Funk and Muir Funk and two brothers and one sister.

“Rade” Funk, as he was known all over Bullitt, was a man of brilliant mind and much ambition, both latent and patent. He was a splendid speaker, witty and eloquent and rendered yoeman service in his party’s behalf in many hard fought campaigns in Bullitt County. There is much by which he will be remembered as the fleeting years go by, but his most distinguishing trait or characteristic was his undying devotion to his wife and children. His whole married life was one long season of absolute devotion to the huge task of educating and caring for his children, and he performed that task well and creditable. His baby, Muir Funk, has been at Georgetown College two years, and Judge Funk was looking forward to the time when his last child would finish school and the stupendous task completed.

From his immense peach orchards, he had sold enough fruit this year to pay all his indebtedness and place him on his feet and with his splendid farm at Brooks, covered with good crops and his large family of children either married and in homes of their own or making their own way the in world, it seemed that the declining years of his life were to be spent in a well-earned rest, but just when the summit was in view and the hopes of a lifetime were about to be realized, the dark shadows of death fell across his pathway and the unseen messenger called him away from his lived ones and left his home in sorrow and gloom. There is tragedy in every death, but if we consider the work performed by Judge Funk, if we consider what he had accomplished, how nearly his work was completed, his sad and untimely death was tragedy indeed. But death takes no account of our labors, neither performed nor those which lie ahead and the work which Judge Funk has almost finished will fall upon other shoulders. His earthly labors have been finished. He has left the world a better place than he found it. He leaves behind him ten splendid, bright-minded, confident, accomplished children, well educated and equipped for life’s battles and he has left to them a record of labors performed of which they may well fell proud.

We tender to the stricken ones our sympathy and we feel that their great loss is one which is shared by our entire county.