Therese Barthold's husband called her Wicker Wanda, because she couldn't get enough of the furniture that she first began restoring 25 years ago.
Barthold of Ham Lake, who said she enjoyed hunting for the furniture more than restoring it, died Jan. 5 in Maplewood of complications from cancer.
She was 76.
Her husband, Jake, would help her with the repairs sometimes at their Ham Lake home, but she was the designer and re-weaver.
"It's hard going," said her husband, who has served in various elected posts in Ham Lake for nearly 45 years. "It's tough on the hands. ... You've got to be careful."
After graduating from high school in Columbia Heights, Barthold, a Fridley native, became a nurse. She worked at the old Swedish Hospital in Minneapolis, and later, at Epiphany Catholic School in Coon Rapids.
Her first restoration was a chair that turned out to be quite an antique. It was built in Massachusetts in the early 1920s, made of reeds on an oak frame.
After she researched the chair's origin, the company, Heywood-Wakefield, sent her a plaque about the piece.
