Innovation is hardly a word used with funeral homes, but the Dannel family, celebrating over 100 years of service, has achieved unique firsts throughout their history. 

Through the years, the Dannels have become the ultimate resource for Texoma families. Our mission is to do whatever it takes to ensure that your experience is meaningful, and one of the ways we do that is by calling on our experience serving families like yours.

Our business began when John Carlton Dannel, who worked with his father, Charles Oliver Dannel, at the family funeral home in Greenfield, IL, came to Sherman in 1908 and bought the Sherman Undertaking Parlor at Houston and Walnut Streets. In 1913, the business moved to a renovated pool hall on the south side of the square.

A progressive thinker, John, nicknamed “big John” introduced the first motorized hearse to the area in 1917. Progress had its price, however. He was sued by the livery stable which provided horses and carriages for funerals. After a publicity fight in the local paper, he convinced the public and his accusers of his sincerity and won the case!

The Dannel Funeral Home building on Walnut Street was completed in 1923, the first in the area, and one of the first in Texas, to be built for the sole purpose of serving as a funeral home.

“At the time most, if not all, funeral homes were converted houses – hence the expression, ‘funeral home,’” said Charles Dannel III. He said that John C. liked the way the Sherman Public Library looked and asked an architect, John Tullock, to build him a funeral home across the street from what is now the Red River Historical Museum.

In 1914 Tullock was also hired to design and build the Dannel family home at 1026 N. Hopson in Sherman.

John’s son, Charles Oliver Dannel II, returned to Sherman after graduating from the University of Texas. He married Frances Rose Bird who attended Kidd-Key Conservatory of Music in Sherman. The couple had three children.

John Carlton II, an Austin College graduate, married Patricia King and they had three children. John died in 1997 at the age of 56 and his widow, Pat, a former nursing instructor and school nurse, acquired her funeral director’s license and became the owner and manager of Dannel Funeral Home.

Pat was joined by her son, Charles Oliver Dannel III, also an Austin College graduate, who became the fifth generation of Dannels in the funeral home business. Charles and his wife, Elizabeth, have a son, John Carlton III and a daughter, Natalie Anne.