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The Enterprise

Ruth Blanchard, 94

Services for Ruth Shirley Moore Blanchard, 94 of Blair, who died October 5, 1996 at Memorial Community Hospital, will be at 2 p.m. Wednesday, October 9 at St. Mary’s Episcopal Church in Blair. Burial will be in the Blair Cemetery.

Visitation will be from 3 p.m. to 6 p.m. Tuesday with a service at the funeral home beginning at 7 p.m.

Ruth Shirley Moore Blanchard was born April 23, 1902 in Omaha to Phillip and Wilhelmina “Dolly” Cruickshank Moore. She grew up in Omaha and moved to Blair in 1914.

She attended Blair High School, graduating in 1920 and attended Dana College. She married Tom H. Blanchard in Blair on May 6, 1923.

She and her husband sang on the Chautauqua circuit, had a radio show in Chicago for a number of years, before moving to Blair in 1942 to reside in the “house on the hill,” which had been her parents’ home.

She taught music in Western Nebraska for a while. She and Tom also taught a couple of years in the Priviloff Island. In Washington County, she taught the “lower room” at March School with Tom teaching the “upper room” after they came back to Blair. She also continued to sing and play the piano.

She was a member and was a Past Matron of McKinley Chapter No. 161, the Order of Eastern Star. She had also held other offices in Eastern Star. She was a member of Monday Afternoon Club and St. Mary’s Episcopal Church.

She was preceded in death by her husband, Tom, who died June 10, 1984.

She is survived by a sister and brother-in-law, Mary and Dr. Irvin Tilden of Hawaii; two nieces, Mary and Sally; a nephew Steve, a nephew on her husband’s side and his wife, Roland and Simone Blanchard and her husband’s nieces, Elinor and Louise Scholar.

Sievers-Sprick Funeral Home in Fort Calhoun is in charge of arrangements.

~~~ Obituary courtesy of the Washington County Genealogical Society. Newspaper clippings on file in the Blair Public Library at Blair, Nebraska.~~~