- Date Of Birth: June 19, 1927
- Date Of Death: December 31, 2010
- State: Illinois
Robert F. Whalen, D.V.M., 83, of 1900 Chartres St. in La Salle, passed away peacefully on Friday morning, December 31, 2010 at his home.
Dr. Whalen was born June 19, 1927 in St. Marys Hospital in La Salle to Duke and Mayme (Nertney) Whalen. He attended St. Patricks Grade School in La Salle and La Salle-Peru Township High School where he graduated in 1945. He served in the U.S. Army from 1945-47. He attended the University of Illinois in Champaign-Urbana where he received his B.S. degree in 1949 and D.V.M. in 1952. He was the youngest man in the first class of twenty-four students to get the Doctor of Veterinary Medicine degree at the University of Illinois. During the summer of 1951, he and his father built the La Salle animal hospital and for the next fifty-two years, he practiced veterinary medicine there. On November 11th, 1955, he married Beverly Linne in Tonica.
Dr. Whalens interests included Irish history and literature, trees and flying. He traveled to Ireland five times during his life, and spent an entire year with his family in Ireland beginning in 1967. Throughout his life, he planted many rare and unusual trees, particularly beech trees, around his house and animal hospital in La Salle. And he owned and flew a seaplane for twenty-two years.
Dr. Whalen helped found the Illinois-Michigan Canal Volunteers, Inc. and initiated the restoration of the canal from Utica to La Salle. The I-M Canal Volunteers efforts resulted in the canal being designated the first National Heritage Corridor in the United States. In 1997, he was honored as a member of the I-M Canal Sesquicentennial Commission.
Dr. Whalen served on the La Salle Grade School board from 1962-66. He was president of the La Salle Rotary Club from 1966-67 and was responsible for forming the Rotary Club of Mendota in 1967. He was secretary of the La Salle County Conservation District from 1969-73. He was a lifetime member of the Illinois Veterinary Medical Association and an honor roll member of the American Veterinary Medical Association. He was a member of the Experimental Aircraft Association and Lake Flyers Club. And he organized several seaplane fly-ins at Lake DePue starting in 1997.
Survivors include son, Tim Whalen and his partner, Aneka Kalicka of La Salle and Seattle, WA; daughter, Kerrylyn Whalen-Rodriguez and her four children, Elysia, Katiana, Kurt and Seth of Freeport; son Jamie and his wife, dAndre Willis, of Milwaukee, WI and childhood friend Margareth Strout Gibbs.
He was preceded in death by his parents, his wife, Beverly, and his brother, George.
