Reception to honor Bea Ruegg

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There will be a surprise reception after the 11 a.m. Mass Sunday for Bea Ruegg who turned 85 on August 13. Family, friends and parishioners will gather in the Parish Activity Center for cake and punch.

The family has made a “Love Box” for Bea – a beautiful wooden treasure chest which Cheryl Ruegg decorated and varnished. It contains mementos contributed by friends. She also will be remembered in the Mass intentions.

After the reception, relatives only, will meet at the Green Community Center, from 2 to 6 p.m. Relatives from several states, will attend the celebration: North Carolina, Utah, California, Nevada, Michigan, Colorado, Florida. Son Marty will announce each family as they enter the hall (like they do at weddings), with loud, appropriate music (like they have at football games) playing during the entrance. We will have videos of our family (ones that dad took before he passed away), as well as current pictures, all playing on DVDs with some of mom's favorite songs. After we eat, there will be a time for anyone with special things, to do them. Son-in-law Dave Zak will play Alley Cat & Adam's Polka on his accordion, two of mom's favorite pieces. Marty will play a song he wrote for his mother, on his banjo. Daughter Diane Zak will do a short entertaining, science demonstration,.

Here is the story of Beatrice Ruegg written by her daughter, Diana Zak.

The Life of Beatrice Cloward Ruegg

By Diane Zak
Mom was born on August 13, 1924, in a large farm house in Payson , Utah . Onions were the major produce her dad grew on the farm but he also raised sugar beets and small amounts of all the other vegetables. He had 3,000 chickens and one of mom’s daily chores, before the age of six, was to gather eggs from the chickens’ nests. When she needed new shoes, her parents would take a bucket of eggs to the shoe store to pay for the shoes. During the depression days, on Sundays, they would take the eggs to Mr. Henry’s store that was next to the theater, and give him ten eggs for ten cents to go to the movie and give him another five eggs for five cents worth of penny candy. Mom and her sisters loved to watch her dad and brothers get a chicken for their dinner. They would catch them and then take an ax and chop off their heads and the chickens would still jump around a little. Later they would pluck the feathers and get them ready for Grandma to cook.

By the time mom was six years old, she was old enough to work in the fields. She started by hoeing one row of onions a day and Grandpa paid her ten cents for the day’s work. She would also weed onions, thin beets, sort onions, top onions, cut potatoes, pick strawberries and beans to earn spending money over the years.

During the depression years, mom took turns with her brothers and sisters selling 100 pound bags of onions for ten cents a sack. During the depression her family ate like kings, but could not buy a pair of shoes. Mom loved the farm, but unfortunately, at age thirteen, Grandpa lost the farm and they were forced to move.

Mom’s Aunt Lizzie owned the only hotel in Payson, and since she was moving to Salt Lake City , she let Grandma and Grandpa take over the hotel. There were thirteen steady boarders and enough room for fifteen transients. By this time, mom’s oldest sister and her brothers were married. This left mom and her two other sisters, Maxine, and Edna, to do the work of making breakfast, lunch, and a full course dinner seven days a week. They also had to help with the wash, make the beds, and do the dishes.

One story I remember mom telling me was when she was in high school, one evening she and six of her friends went to the home of a new teacher who was ironing on the front porch in her pajamas. Mom and her friends introduced themselves and then picked up the teacher and carried her three blocks from her home, and left her there at the Post Office. Surprisingly the teacher and mom’s group of “kidnappers” became very good friends.

Last year, one of mom’s high school friends, one of the “kidnappers”, came to visit mom for a week. They hadn’t seen each other for sixty years. Mom always did keep in touch with her friends and relatives from out west. Mom was always writing letters, to friends, relatives, and most importantly, to dad. Not only did they have a long distance relationship while they were dating, but also after they were married. Dad was a salesman, which took him away from home quite a lot of the time. Mom saved all of dad’s letters. They are a wonderful love story!

When mom moved to Salt Lake City , Grandpa fixed up the basement and made rooms for seven girls.They became very close with all the girls who rented the rooms. One of the “girls”, Eileen, who mom hasn’t seen in sixty years, just came to Ohio in June to spend a week with mom. They had a great time reminiscing. Eileen and mom used to share an 8 by 10 inch picture frame since they didn’t have enough money for each of them to buy one of their own. Eileen would put her boyfriend’s picture in it for one month, and then mom would put a picture of her boyfriend, in it for a month.

Maxine and Que, mom’s sister and her husband, had two of Que’s Navy buddies over for dinner one night. They saw a picture of mom and tossed a coin to see who would write to her. Dad won and wrote her a letter. After three months of writing, mom and dad met. It was love at first sight. A few nights after dad met mom, he stopped at a pay phone on the street and called his mother in New York and told her “I have met an old fashion girl and I want to marry her.” Two weeks later, dad gave mom a diamond ring. They were married on March 22, 1945. The wedding cost a total of $13.00 for flowers and invitations.

Several years and several children later, we moved to Akron , Ohio on South Main Street across from Holy Cross Cemetery . The house had a fireplace in the living room. Whenever it got warm outside, we had problems with bees in the house. Grandma Cloward, mom’s mom, came to visit from Utah . She commented that when she told every one she was going to visit Bea, she didn’t think she would see so many bees! One day, we couldn’t see the chimney on the outside of the house because there was such a large swarm of bees in front of it. We later found out that there was a large bee hive in our attic. After smoking out thousands of bees, we no longer had any problems.

When we were small, mom was so busy during the day taking care of us children, she would stay up till 2:00 am making our clothes, including the boy’s jackets and my coat. She even made doll clothes to match my clothes.

Mom kept a spotless house. Everything had a place and everything had to be in its place. Saturday was work day. We had to get up early to dust, vacuum, and anything else that had to be done, all this before we were allowed to watch cartoons or go play.

During the years between Marty and Mark, mom and dad talked of adopting a baby. But ten years after Marty, Mark was born. You would think after having so many kids, mom would know just what to do with a new born baby. Instead, she felt very unsure of herself. Because of the RH factor, mom came home from the hospital before Mark. When it was time to go get him, mom asked me to go in her place. Of course when we got home, it all came back to her!

Mom took time out of her busy schedule to write her autobiography and her “Reflections of Dad”. These articles mean a great deal to us kids.

With each passing year there have been many additions to our family. Dad said he was the last Ruegg in his family. After having eight boys there are now many, many Rueggs. It took a few generations, but in addition to having many boys in the Ruegg family, there are also many girls, with twenty-four grandchildren and twenty-two great grandchildren, and another one due this August.

The Ruegg Family:

Here is the family of George Ruegg born June 30, 1924 and died. Oct 9, 2003 and
Beatrice Cloward born Aug. 13, 1924

Richard Ruegg born May 4, 1946
Children:
Jeff (Tracy) and children Danny Hollar, Collin and Julia
Dale
Brian and son Ryan

Diane (Dave) Zak born Feb 9, 1948
Children:
Adam (Pennie) and children Laniece Russo, Destny, Elizabeth
Patricia (Rob) Dye and children Edward, David and Hannah
David

Michael (Coletta) Ruegg born December 16, 1948
Children:
Michael (Diana) and children Joshua, Samantha and Leah
Tina (Mike) Nemeth and children Vincent Ruegg, Nathan Nemeth and Alexa Nememth
Krista (William) Stone and chidren Nicholas, Eric and Zachary

Dennis Reugg born Sept 18, 1950

Donald (Lina) Ruegg born Aug. 13, 1952
Children:
Carolyn (Keith) Schell and children Haleigh and Brooke
Daniel (Beth) Ruegg and daugher Alice
Jill (Dan) Gravo and child McKenna

Dale Ruegg born Jan 25, 1954 died Dec. 12, 1959

Patricia Ann Ruegg born Dec 13, 1955 died Dec 18, 1955

David (Cheryl) Ruegg born Feb. 13, 1957
Children:
Jason (Melissa) born July 13, 1978 and daughter Morgan
Eric deceased
Ryan
Aaron
Brennan

Marty (Jeanne) Ruegg born Jan 9, 1960
Children:
Brianne
Alex
Travis

Mark (Buffy) Ruegg