Support Richard D. Bartholomew's Family

With tears filling my eyes, I struggle to find the words to type this. Our loving father, Richard D. Bartholomew, passed away peacefully, surrounded by the ones who love him, on Monday (12/16) evening. This was a terrible and painful 13 days for not only Rick but our family too, December 3rd he wasn’t feeling to well so him and Maria went to the ER where they discovered that he had cancer in his system again so they scheduled a biopsy for the 12th which led to him being admitted to Saint Catherine’s Hospital because they could not perform it at that time due to too low of blood pressure and extremely low sodium levels which over the next 4 days they continued to try and help get them back to levels they were confident in completing the biopsy but sadly those levels were never reached. Monday the 16th they performed a Bronchoscopy where they discovered our father’s lung and liver were nearly completely filled with stage 4 cancer and one of his lungs was collapsed. After the Bronchoscopy his doctor insisted we all meet at the hospital to talk with him and more or less we were unfortunately told our father would not be leaving the hospital because of the severity the cancer had already reached, the pneumonia and his collapsed lung we were faced with the worst decision we’ve ever had to make and that was to take him off life support and fulfill his wishes of not trying to put him through chemo again.

He was an amazing man who loved his family and friends with all his heart. He was also the sole provider for his family, and this is where things will get extremely tough for all of us. The funeral costs, medical bills, and trying to pay bills with all of Rick and Maria’s income/assets frozen it is making things near impossible and on top of that we’ve been quoted it could take up till April for things to even be processed and put into Maria’s name so she has an income again.

If you can find it in your hearts, any little bit will be greatly appreciated and help tremendously we’ve been given a very tough deadline of only 1 week from DATE OF DEATH Monday (12/23) to come up with the ENTIRE Cremation expenses 3150$.

We need help getting through this as a family and doing whatever we can to fulfill Ricky’s wishes of being cremated.

Obituary Below:

Richard Duane Bartholomew, 65 years old, passed away Monday, December 16, 2024 at

Froedtert South: Saint Catherine Hospital in Pleasant Prairie, WI, surrounded by his loving family.

He was the son of Robert and Helen Bartholomew, born August 20, 1959 in Mondovi, WI.

He graduated from Bradford High School in 1978.

He worked as a mechanic and machinist most his life while enjoying hunting and fishing in his past time with his family and friends.

On May 31, 1985 he married his best friend and love of his life: Maria Schneider of Kenosha WI.

Survivors include his Wife: Maria Bartholomew; sister: Patricia (Vincent) Caira of Kenosha, WI; brothers:

Robert (Lisa) Bartholomew of Racine, WI; and Wayne (Tina) Bartholomew of Kenosha, WI. Richard also is

survived by his sons: Richard Robert (Nicole) Bartholomew., Timothy Bartholomew of Kenosha. grandchildren: Dawson, Tristen, Adryanna, Aubree, Payton, and Landon.

Richard was preceded in death by his parents: Robert (Helen Rud) Bartholomew; grandparents: Robert (Lillian) Bartholomew; Elmer (Gladys) Rud; brothers: Steven Bartholomew and Matthew Bartholomew; son: David Bartholomew; nephew: Brian Bartholomew; father-in-law; Robert Schneider.; mother-in-law: June (Maxey) Schneider.

A celebration of life will be held in the near future.

Thank you for all the love, support, and donations.

Update; As of 10pm 12/20 we have raised 1870$ of the 3150$ needed by 12/23