Jill Ann Worm

Jill Ann Worm was a Wisconsin girl who scaled the professional heights of fashion retailing and merchandising. In her retirement, she returned to her love of painting and gravitated to landscapes much like those found in her Wisconsin homeland.
Jill attended the University of Wisconsin (the real one, in Madison) and graduated with a degree in retailing. She started her career at Marshall Field's in Chicago in millinery. But not before heading off to Woodstock (the real one in New York). She never got there but did successfully see her idol Janice Joplin in concert in Chicago shortly after that.
After 15 years at Marshall Fields, having advanced to senior buyer and merchandising manager, Jill took her talents to Sears. As Vice President of Private Brands, she did her best to add style and panache to some of the private label properties of the World's Largest Store.
As successful as she was in business, Jill invested much energy and compassion in visiting her family in Wisconsin Rapids and in helping to support a young girl from the Girls and Boys Club. She also was a first-rate party-thrower, specializing in Halloween costume parties (think Janice Joplin).
On her retirement, Jill dove headfirst into her passion for painting. She studied at the Chicago Art Institute, Evanston Art Center, and International School of Drawing and Painting in Italy. She spent several weeks painting in a hill town in Umbria which inspired a collection of paintings based on the Italian landscape. She also loved the architectural landscape surrounding her home in Chicago and painted many cityscapes in her evolving cubist style.
Jill's love of art lead her to the love of her life, Bob Horn, her instructor at the Evanston Art Center. They enjoyed seventeen years together, travelling, painting, and entertaining friends in her beautiful home in Chicago. Bob pre-deceased her by two years, after she nursed him through his own medical challenges.
Jill is survived and dearly loved by many friends and especially by a loyal and caring family. Her sister, Ann Pickett, nephew Ethan (Sara) Pickett and baby Waylon, niece Hannah (Matt) Winckler and baby Lydia Jill. And Matisse the cat.
As one of Jill's dear friends says, "Orange will never be the same." We have all been touched in a special way by our Jill.