Even though most figures we honor during Women’s History Month are famous like Susan B. Anthony and Rosa Parks, my big sister, Rosemary Teutsch, may also qualify.
“Rosie” was the first feminist I ever knew, if feminism meant sticking up for liberties unfairly denied to women. She grew up in our Evergreen Park home with seven men, counting Dad. Nancy would come along eight years later, but Rosie had to carve her own way long before that.
Her six brothers made no allowances for her being a girl. Indeed, she had dolls and Sunday dresses but stood with us toe-to-toe.
All through grammar school, she could whip me if I picked a fight, as when I tried to take her window seat in Dad’s station wagon. She could also throttle Kenneth, Pat and Kevin. Granted, we were younger, but we were sure she could beat up our elder brother James, as well. What she had going for her was surprising upper body strength. Just as important, the psychological advantage of being right.
Considering all the testosterone in the crowded three-bedroom house, it was natural for her to align with our mother, Gertrude McGrath. They become allies. More like sisters.
Which was a boon for the rest of us, insofar as we essentially had two mothers, only one of whom you could curse in front of. Or belch.
Two mothers, as counselors and anchors, constituted our concept of home. When one of us headed home from college, from the army, from the seminary, from Vietnam, from the hospital, from the police station — home meant Mom and Rosie.
How Rosie balanced Gert’s lessons (always send a thank you card, put a dollar in the church envelope every Sunday, never forget to make your bed) with her feelings for us could not have been easy. Emulating Mom, she became righteous, caring, gentle and devout, while still realizing kinship with the slobbish, reckless ruffians she also loved.
Epitomized being a big sister
This posed a dilemma for my sister during a string of summers when our parents were away, and the “mice would play,” as the brothers transformed our home into “Animal House,” vibrating with deafening music, drunken revelry, wrestling matches and 4 a.m. showers under the garden hose. I thought it might be the last straw for Rosie when a naked inebriate hid high in the front yard elm tree to welcome party goers; or on a different night altogether when James and his underage brother (ahem) were hauled into the police station.
But Rosie never ratted us out. And her love never wavered.
She epitomized what it means to be a big sister: She was proud of me for everything, even my haircut. She listened and was the first one I told I wanted to leave the seminary, when I was loath to tell my parents. She gave good advice but didn’t get angry when I didn’t follow it. I could cry in front of her. And I never felt as bad as when she was disappointed in me.
Later, as a 3rd grade teacher, Rosie risked vulnerability to sing and play her guitar for her students and eventually the entire school. She became the go-to teacher for special events, and for directing the children and leading the congregation in song at church services, and with our youngest sibling Nancy at weddings and funerals.
Don, the love of Rosie’s life, was an Army veteran and the most ardent conversationalist I knew. He died young, breaking Rosie’s heart, but not her will, staying strong to raise Mike, an electrician, and Jen, who followed Mom’s footsteps as a teacher.
There’s a Super 8 home movie from our road trip to Florida in Dad’s Pontiac wagon in 1963. A ten-second clip shows Rosie in a two-piece strolling pool-side at our motel in Fort Lauderdale. All tan and youthful grace, she spots the camera and cocks her head in modesty. The film is silent, but I can hear her laughter as she tosses back her head while bustling away.
The same laughter I remember from her annual Christmas party. Or when Don, Jen or Mike blew out birthday candles.
The same laughter years ago as Rosie pushed me in a buggy down 54th Street.
Our easy going, resilient, independent big sister died after battling brain cancer on the third day of Women’s History Month, 2025, at age 76, after a life mirroring the amazing strength of countless other not so famous women who are heroes to those who knew them.
David McGrath is a former English professor at the College of DuPage and author of Far Enough Away, a collection of short stories based in the Chicago area.
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