She was originally named Alice M. Williamson, but her name was changed to Ruth Alida shortly after her birth. She is listed here under her birth name, but she married four times and was also known as Ruth Teetor, Ruth Landen, Ruth Brief, and Ruth Smudski.

She was born in Pluckemin, NJ, perhaps in the now-gone Fenner House where her elder brothers were born or perhaps down the street in another house purchased by her parents in 1922.

Her parents' marriage ended in 1928, and her mother was hospitalized. She was raised by family friends, Howard and Idabelle Demaray, in Somerville, NJ. In the 1930 Census she is listed as a boarder and in the 1940 Census she is listed as a daughter. She graduated from Somerville High School.

She married attorney Paul R. Teetor (1919-2000) in October 1943 in Spokane, WA while he was serving in the U.S. Air Force. In a marriage announcement in a Princeton University publication, she was described as a "Greenwich Village artist." They were married for only months before he was deployed. He was MIA by February 1944 and was a POW in Germany 1944-1945. This brief wartime marriage collapsed, and they divorced in 1946 in Dade County, Florida.

She subsequently married Melrick "Rick" Landen (1922-1961) in 1948 in NYC and was living in in Hastings-on-Hudson, NY in 1959. He was a writer and business executive. They had one son Todd born in 1953. She was widowed in 1961.

She married NYU professor Richard P. Brief (1933-2013) in 1962. They appear to have divorced in the early 1970s. He remarried in 1980.

She married Unitarian minister J. Robert Smudski (1919-1980) sometime in the 1970s and moved from Hastings-on-Hudson to Orlando, Florida in 1976 where he took charge of the 1st Unitarian Church.

Her birth family lost touch with her about 1962. In her father's 1978 obituary she was listed as Ruth Teetor of White Plains, NY which reflects this estrangement.

She was described in her brief obituary as an artist.