Drafted into the Army as a senior in high school, Raymond J. Grymski was on a boat headed toward Japan when the first atomic bomb was dropped. Before the troops knew about the bomb, “His troop did not have a next assignment; the page was blank; they thought they would all be killed,” said his son Ray. Part of the Allied occupation force, Mr. Grymski served as a hospital administrator in Tokyo. The work piqued an interest for him in numbers and administration and led to a career in accounting for wholesaler Cotter & Co., now a cooperative of independent hardware stores called TruServ Corp. in Chicago. A resident of Huntley the last year, Mr. Grymski, 77, died of lung cancer Tuesday, March 2, in the Rosewood Care Center, a nursing home in Elgin. Born and raised in Chicago, he returned to the city after the war, working during the day and taking accounting classes on the GI Bill at night at the Northwestern University campus downtown. He married his first wife, Dorothy, in 1952. Mr. Grymski started as an accountant for Cotter & Co. in 1957. He and his family lived in Chicago until 1965, when they moved to Niles. After the death of his wife in 1986, Mr. Grymski moved to Glenview. He met his second wife, Eleanor, at a dance. They married in 1992. By then the chief accountant at TruServ Corp., Mr. Grymski retired the same year. He and his wife traveled and enjoyed playing bridge and square dancing. Other survivors include another son, Paul Bruner; two daughters, Deb Walters and Nancy Parks; a sister, Arlene; and eight grandchildren. A visitation will begin at 9 a.m. Saturday in St. Mary Catholic Church, 10307 Dundee Rd., Huntley. Mass will be said at 10 a.m. Saturday in the church.
