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Andres, Ruth Louise (1922-1944)
Mennonite Weekly Review obituary: 1944 Mar 23 p. 5
Birth date: 1922 Dec 17
text of obituary:
. . .
— The many friends of Mr. and Mrs. P. C. Andres of route three deeply empathize with them over the loss of their only daughter, Ruth, age 21, who died Monday afternoon at the Bethel Deaconess Hospital after a severe illness of about two weeks. Her sickness started first as a cold and flu, from which complications developed later. Always cheerful and endowed with some unusual gifts, she has served for a number of years as a teacher in the children's department of the First Mennonite church, where her vacant place will be hard to fill. She was a student of the Mennonite Bible Academy at North Newton. Funeral services will be held at 2:30 Thursday afternoon at the First Mennonite church, with Rev. J. E. Entz and Rev. Arnold Regier in charge. The services at the home southeast of town will be conducted by Dr. P. A. Penner. The immediate family surviving are her parents and two brothers.. Walter and Harold. Harold has been confined at his home because of the measles during past week.
Mennonite Weekly Review obituary: 1944 Mar 30 p. 5
text of obituary:
. . .
— One of the largest funerals held at the First Mennonite church this year took place Thursday afternoon when Miss Ruth Andres, daughter of Mr. and Mrs. P. C. Andres, was taken to her final earthly resting place. Ruth was seriously ill for about two weeks previous to her death, which occurred Monday afternoon, March 21. She had been a student at the Mennonite Bible Academy, was a teacher of the six-year-old children's class in the First Mennonite Sunday School, a work which was very close to her heart. The services at the home were conducted by Dr. P. A. Penner, while at the church Rev. J. E. Entz and Rev. Arnold Regier of North Newton were in charge. Appropriate messages in song were presented by the young people's choir and by the students of the Bible Academy, who sang "My God and I." A short committal serivce was held at Greenwood cemetery, where buriel [sic] was made. Two brothers, Harold and Walter, were unable to attend the funeral as both were ill with the measles, Walter being a patient at the Bethel Deaconess Hospital. His small daughter Kathleen also had the measles and was being cared for at the home of Mrs. Andres' mother, Mrs. Susie Toevs at 625 Southeast 2nd street.
Mennonite Weekly Review obituary: 1944 Apr 6 p. 3
text of obituary:
RUTH LOUISE ANDRES
I turned my eyes from earth away
Far to the hills above;
My master stood there on that day
And called me with His love.
I know not how I rose and came
To Him who waited there—
I only know He spoke my name
And all was wond'rous fair.
Whosoever liveth and believeth on me shall never die.
Believest thou this? She saith unto him, Yea Lord;
I have believed that thou art the Christ, the Son of God.
With her life, brief though it was, Ruth spoke this belief to her Master and left to us the full assurance that she belonged to Him. to serve! This was her life's aim and joy. The walls of the home still echo with the song of her heart that rang so often through the rooms when she awoke in the morning!
"I'll be somewhere working
I'll be somewhere working
I'll be somewhere working for my Lord."
Ruth enjoyed to work. Only death could put to rest her hands which toiled through the years in unceasing devotion. Early in her girlhood, it became manifest that to her hands had been given the gift of skillful doing. How wonderful the truth that He who plans our life, creates us for that plan! After a severe illness at eleven years of age, it became manifest that her life would forego much that others of her age would enjoy. But Ruth, having to retreat from school again and again, put her hands and heart to work in the home, fashioning skillfully many joys for the wide circle of those she loved. And while her hands toiled away, her Master wove into her soul the threads which gave her inner life its early ripening.
Should we seek a key to her life, it would be "joy". In spite of physical handicaps and suffering, there was an inner acceptance of it all which gave to her the victory of joy, compelling always to activity.
Outside of her home and loved ones, of special interest to her and a source of deep joy was her Sunday School class of little ones where her love for children and for service in the church was clearly manifested. And there was the joy of returning to school! With the opening of our academy, Ruth enrolled, first timidly as a special student, then fully as a senior. With deep satisfaction she persued her studies and became a leader to the younger students there.
The third source of joy through this past year was the preparation for her parent's silver wedding which falls on April 10. As so often before, Ruth's heart and hands have made everything ready, from the silver wreath for her parents to the napkins for the tables — all is in readiness! Little did she know that in the heart of God her life was planned to be the wreath that should adorn her parents on that day. What greater blessing could God lay on life on earth together than to take a child unto Himself.
Ruth came to us on the seventeenth of December, ninteen [sic] hundred and twenty-two. God called her from us on March the twentieth, nineteen hundred and forty-four.
