[2] He then was owner and President of John E. Grotberg and Associates, Financial Development Consultants, and General Manager of the Hotel Baker, a retirement home run by the Lutheran Social Services of Illinois.

[1] A resident of St. Charles, Illinois, from 1955, and active in many civic and social organizations, Grotberg was an enthusiastic supporter of the fine arts, having been engaged in many musical and theatrical enterprises himself.

[1] Two bills which carried his mark were an amendment to the Defense Department authorization urging the armed forces to "use domestic equipment when entertaining in federal buildings" (prompted by an observation of a Yamaha piano being used by the Navy Choir at the Capitol) [5] and Public Law 99-202, the Save for the USA Year, which resulted in "the largest number of savings bonds sales in the United States in several decades.

[6] During much of his political career, Grotberg successfully battled cancer,[7] including experimental treatments at the National Institutes of Health that later became standard therapies throughout the US and the world.

26 year old WLKB DeKalb, Ill radio program director Mark Powell learned of the plan from State Rep. John Countryman (R-DeKalb).

[9] Hastert defeated Democratic candidate Mary Lou Kearns, the Kane County Coroner by an unusually narrow margin in the typically Republican district.

Following a funeral at Baker Memorial Methodist Church in St. Charles (where he had been a longtime member and regular soloist), he was buried in Union Cemetery with full military honors.