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In Loving Memory Of
Ruth Hardy Ferguson
Ruth Hardy Ferguson was born May 5, 1895, in Fort Worth, Texas, to
William Jasper and Mattie Horn Hollingsworth, the third of eight
children. She passed peacefully from this life, Thursday, April 20,
2006, just fifteen days before her 111th birthday.
Ruth started to grade school at White Mound, Texas (near Sherman),
and graduated on her seventeenth birthday from Decatur, Texas. She
attended North Texas State Teachers College that summer, and by fall had
started teaching at one-room Joe Bailey School near Decatur for $45 a
month, driving a horse and buggy four miles each day, with her younger
brother and sister as two of her students.
Ruth taught the next five years at Howe, Texas and attended summer
school at Texas University at Austin. She started a junior high
teaching position in Marietta, Oklahoma, in 1918. Ruth married Dudley
Hardy, a Marietta hardware merchant, on May 25, 1919, at the age of
twenty-four (an old maid at that time). Dudley died of a heart attack
on September 29, 1930, the same year that the Great Depression hit
Oklahoma. This left Ruth a widow at thirty-five, with five children
aged 2, 4, 6, 8, and 10. Ruth spent the next two and a half years
attending Southeastern State Teachers College in Durant, Oklahoma,
graduating with Phi Beta Kappa honors with a BA degree in math and art.
She taught nine years in Fox, Oklahoma, and received her MA degree in
Secondary Education and History in 1938 from the University of
Oklahoma. She also attended summer school at George Washington
University and Colorado State University at Greeley, Colorado.
In 1942, Ruth and her family moved to Pauls Valley where she taught
junior high geography, history, and math for twenty-two years, until her
retirement in 1966 at the age of 69. She continued to substitute teach
for several years. In 1966, Ruth married John Holmes Ferguson of
Amarillo, Texas, whom she had known as a teenager. He died December 24,
1970.
During her Pauls Valley teaching career, Ruth was the Pauls Valley
Junior High Pep Club sponsor for 13 years. She spent eight summers
beginning in 1954, as a Girl Scout counselor at a camp in the Catskill
Mountains in New York State.
- Ruth loved to travel. She visited all fifty states and six
continents. At the age of 95, she went to China, and the next year,
to New Zealand and Australia.
- Ruth was a member of the 1st United Methodist Church
in Pauls Valley, where she taught Sunday school for many years. She
was a member and past president of the Colonial Dames, DAR, Delta
Kappa Gamma Society, Alternate Saturday Club, and the Wesleyan
Service Guild. She was a member of the American Association of
University Women, Oklahoma Retired Educators, NEA-OEA, Pauls Valley
Art Club, and Pauls Valley China Painters. She served as secretary
of the Garvin County Democratic Party from 1979-1983.
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- Ruth was preceded in death by her parents, William Jasper and
Mattie Horn Hollingsworth, sisters, Rita Johnson and Alda Francis,
brothers, Carl Hollingsworth, Jessie Hollingsworth, William Jasper
Hollingsworth, Jr., Forest Hollingsworth, and Kenneth Hollingsworth,
husbands Dudley Hardy and John Holmes Ferguson, son Dudley Hardy,
Jr. and wife Mary Sue, son-in-law Harry S. Culver, and
daughters-in-law Marguerite Hardy and Catherine Hardy.
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- Ruth is survived by her sons: Reverend Andy Forest Hardy, of
Murfreesboro, Tennessee, and William Carey Hardy and wife Kellene,
of Richardson, Texas, daughters: Mattie Lee Culver, of Oklahoma
City, and Gayle Smith, of Pauls Valley, sixteen grandchildren:
Barbara Gale Bailey, of Murfreesboro, Tennessee, Andy Hardy, Jr.,
and wife Pam, of Muscle Shoals, Alabama, Ronald Glen Hardy, of
Murfreesboro, Tennessee, Dudley Hardy III, of Oklahoma City, Betty
Sue DeCou and husband Bill, of Jonesboro, Louisiana, Linda Slott, of
Oklahoma City, Dr.’s Peggy DuBois and husband Gary, of Oklahoma
City, Reverend David Culver and wife Allison, of Liberty, Missouri,
Jerry Rutherford and husband Allen, of Longview, Texas, Dr. Bonnie
Ballard, of Las Vegas, Nevada, Marsha Meave, of Pauls Valley, Holly
Gomez and husband Tony, of Norman, Oklahoma, Dr. Deborah Bednar and
husband Willie, of Houston, Texas, Dr. David Hardy, of Las Angeles,
California, Diana Westmoreland and husband Jim, of Santa Fe, New
Mexico, and Dr. Doug Hardy and wife Michelle, of Plano, Texas. Ruth
is also survived by thirty-six great grandchildren, thirty-one
great-great grandchildren, numerous nieces and nephews, and her long
time caregivers: Loretta Boney, Lucille Scribner, Madge Hale, and
Carolyn Miller.
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- Ruth was an amazing woman and an inspiration and mentor to her
family and all who knew her. She was known for her ever-present
optimism, positive thinking, calm reasoning, and even temperament.
All were reflected in her daily living and nearly four decades in
the classroom, educating children. Perhaps her finest attribute was
shown by the depths to which she was loved and respected by her
children, family, and friends. She will be greatly missed.
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- Services for Ruth Hardy Ferguson will be held, Monday, April 24,
at 2:00 P.M. at the 1st United Methodist Church, in Pauls
Valley, under the direction of Stufflebean-Coffey Funeral Home, with
Dr. Robert J. Kanary officiating. Interment will follow at the Rose
Hill Cemetery in Ardmore, Oklahoma.
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- Donations may be sent to Hospice at the Pauls Valley General
Hospital or the 1st United Methodist Church of Pauls
Valley.
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