AUNT RUBY LIVED WITH HER PARENTS AT THE FAMILY HOME ALL OF HER LIFE. MY FAMILY MOVED THERE DURING THE DEPRESSION IN ORDER TO HELP MY GRANDPARENTS. AUNT RUBY WORKED AT THE ABILENE STATE SCHOOL. SHE WAS LAID OFF AROUND 1938 OR 39. SHE HAD NO REAL WORK UNTIL WW II BEGAN. THEN SHE STARTED WORK AT WALGREEN DRUG IN DOWNTOWN ABILENE. RON WORKED WITH HER AT THE DRUG STORE BEGINNING IN 1950. THEN IN 1952 SHE WAS DIAGNOSED WITH THROAT CANCER. IT WAS FAR ADVANCED. SHE WAS TAKEN CARE OF BY HER SISTER, LEEORA, UNTIL SHE DIED IN 1954. SHE HAD ONE VERY SAD EVENT IN HER LIFE, WHICH I BELIEVE AFFECTED HER ALL THE REST OF HER LIFE.

In 1922, at age 20, Ruby had an affair with A VERY PROMINENT BUSINESS MAN IN ABILENE. A child was born in Ranger, Texas. Leeora, her older sister and family tried very hard to keep it all secret. Harry and Leeora lived in Ranger and took Ruby there to have the baby. My mother told me the baby was a girl. They brought the baby back to Brother Nicolas in Abilene, who was a retired Baptist minister working through the West Texas Baptist Sanatorium (now Hendricks Hospital) to set up adoptions and foster care. The baby was adopted out through this connection. Ruby died in 1954 and Leora did not tell my mother about this until about 25 years after Ruby's death. 10 years later, when I was born in 1932, Ruby, as mother says, "sort of took me (Ron) over as her own" and Ruby always told everyone I was really hers. Then when Nancy, my sister, was born in
1945 she would buy her all sorts of clothes and talk about her little girl. Now that I know about all of this it does make me sad for Ruby. Somewhere out there we have a cousin who would be in her seventies (this was written in 1997) if she lived this long.

Her parents were John Waite Humphrey, Sr. and Nancy Matlock Humphrey. Survivors include a daughter who was adopted to an unknown family, 1 brother, 3 sisters, and several nieces and nephews and cousins.

obit from the Abilene Reporter News:
MISS HUMPHREY, 52 CLERK IN ABILENE DRUG STORE, DIES
Miss Ruby Humphrey,52, died at the home of her sister, Mrs. O.H. Gooch, 941 Vine, Sunday noon following a three-months illness. She underwent surgery in June. Miss Humphrey was born Jan. 12, 1902 in Abilene. She graduated from Abilene High School and Draughon's Business College. For the past 10 years she had been a clerk in an Abilene drug store. Survivors include three sisters: Mrs. O.H. Gooch, with whom she lived, Mrs. T.F. Anthony, Breckenridge, and Mrs. Altie Wyatt, Lueders; one brother, J.W. Humphrey, 1349 Hickory.
She was a member of the First Baptist Church. Funeral will be conducted at 4 p.m.in Elliott's Chapel of Memories with Dr. Elwin Skiles, pastor of the First Baptist Church officiating, assisted by Dr. Millard Jenkens, retired Baptist minister, Burial will be in IOOF Cemetery in Abilene. Pallbearers will be Dick Smith, Melvin Evans, Dee Bland, Ernest Lewis, George Duke, Jim Wheeler, W.T. Gilstrap and W. G. Osborn.
The cause of death was cancer of the esophagus. Aunt Ruby had been a life long smoker.
Aunt Ruby had a retirement program through her employer which was Walgreen's Drug company. She left her fund to her nephew, Ron Humphrey who later used this money to attend graduate school at the University of Texas in Austin, Texas. Following his education for the Ph.D. degree Dr. Humphrey spent his entire research career of 35 years at the M.D. Anderson Cancer Center in Houston, Texas.

The A on her headstone is not correct. it should have been an R FOR ROBERTA.