Mrs. Anna Eliza Ruby, 103, Cass county’s “Sunbonnet Lady,” died at 8 o’clock Wednesday night at the Massey nursing home in Virginia.
She had been in failing health for several months, following a checkup at Our Saviour’s hospital in Jacksonville early in September revealed a gall bladder ailment. Since no operation was recommended, Mrs. Ruby returned to the Massey nursing home in time to celebrate her 103rd birthday there Sept. 13.
Although she was showered with gifts, no visitors were permitted since Mrs. Ruby was easily upset by excitement.
Friends from throughout Illinois attended the funeral services held Friday afternoon at the Virginia Christian church. The Rev. George Wilson, pastor, was in charge. Burial in Walnut Ridge cemetery near Virginia.
Mrs. Ruby, a lifelong resident of Cass county, was known to her friends as “Aunt Lide,” but acquired the name of “Sunbonnet Lady” because of the colorful sunbonnets she made and sold throughout the community.
Even when the sunbonnet era was past, Mrs. Ruby continued to receive orders for her bonnets. Although she received Old Age Assistance, she continued to supplement her income by making sunbonnets and wool rugs. The rugs were made from patched wool pieces embroidered and quilted together in odd designs.
When the news of her work received national publicity, her orders for sunbonnets increased so that one year she made as many as 300 sunbonnets. In 1940 Kate Smith devoted part of her radio program to recognition of Mrs. Ruby, and the governor of Illinois sent her congratulations on her birthday. Sunbonnet orders then poured in from Chicago and points as far distant as Utah. At the same time, Mrs. Ruby’s eyes began to fail her. She had to restrict the work she could do, and rejected many orders, but still tried to fill as many as she could.
Mrs. Ruby once said that her only motto was “Early to bed, early to rise, and plenty, plenty of exercise.” She said “The trouble with young folks today” is the hours they keep.
She was married twice. In 1873 she was married to Louis T. Haynes, a young farmer, who died. In 1917 she was married to William David Ruby, who died in 1937. She has no children.
“I don’t even have a niece or a nephew,” she once said, but I have a lot of “adopted ones.”
Current Obituaries in the Astoria South Fulton Argus