Iva Ruth Cooper

A funeral service for Iva Ruth Cooper, 90, of Ames, will be Tuesday, September 18, 2012 at 10:00 a.m. in the Ames Church of Christ with Jerry Mason officiating. Burial will follow in the Ames Cemetery. Services are under the direction of Anderson-Burris Funeral Home, Enid. Iva Ruth was born on February 28, 1922 in Perkins, Oklahoma to Flournoy and Myrtle (Hickman) Courtright and departed this life on September 14, 2012 in the Seiling Nursing Center, Seiling, Oklahoma. Iva Ruth was raised and educated at Ripley, Oklahoma, except five months at Forest Home and one semester at Ames High School. She played basketball for six years in junior high and high school, and was a cheerleader at Ripley School. Iva Ruth was in the junior and senior class plays. When she was a senior, she was elected Secretary of the State Home Economics Association and gave a speech at the State Convention in Oklahoma City. She entered a food preparation contest at OSU and took first place. Iva Ruth graduated from Ripley High School in 1939 with forty-five classmates.She was the oldest of three daughters, and her mother taught Iva Ruth to cook and do household duties at an early age, while the parents worked in the fields. She also hoed and picked cotton with the family. When she was in eighth grade, somebody told her there was to be a race in Ripley on Saturday for groceries – mainly sugar. Sis (Iva Ruth’s nickname) could always run like a rabbit and the family agreed she should be the one to make the run. So Dad hooked the horse and wagon up and the race was on. The trip to Ripley was at least five miles and that was a good trip for those days. But she made the run and won the sugar so the family had sugar for a few days.After graduation, Iva Ruth got a job working in the Triple A office in Stillwater, Oklahoma and worked until she married Don Cooper in February 1944. They went to Santa Ana, California and she took a military correspondence course and worked at the Headquarters of the Western Flying Command in the Signal Office during Don’s first tour in the South Pacific. While he was on his second tour, Iva Ruth returned to Stillwater and worked in the Triple A office until Don’s discharge in 1946. They moved to a farm south of Ames for three years, then to a farm one and a half miles north of Ames, where they lived for sixty-nine years. She loved the farm, gardening, and canning tomatoes and green beans. Iva Ruth helped Don move pipe as they irrigated forty acres of alfalfa. They were the proud parents of two sons, Larry Dean and Neil Jay.Iva Ruth began working at the Meno Guaranty Bank, when Neil stared school. She worked there for thirty-three and a half years, and was the cashier for the last sixteen years, retiring in 1993. She served for several years on the Major County Election Board and helped with the Ames Cemetery, collecting donations and other duties as required.Don and Iva Ruth were members of the Ames Church of Christ for forty-four years, and cleaned the church for eight years until his death in January 2001. Due to her failing health, her family moved her from the Ames farm to Seiling, Oklahoma in October 2009. Iva Ruth was preceded in death by her husband, her parents, two sisters, Etta Moreen Pour and Rose Marie Hayes, and a nephew, Dale Pour. She is survived by her two sons, Larry Cooper of Custer City and Neil Cooper and wife, Debbie of Seiling; three grandchildren, Michele Clayton and husband, Kevin, Chester, Oklahoma, Kristy Butcher and husband, Brady, Elk City, and Ty Cooper and wife, Kerri, Mutual; seven great grandchildren, Trisha, Kale, Kloe, Kylie, Kelsie, Kassidy, and Taycee; one great great granddaughter, Maddilynn; other relatives and friends. Memorials may be made through the funeral home to Ames Church of Christ, Ames Fire Department, Ames Cemetery Associaiton or the Seiling Nursing Center. Condolences may be made online at www.andersonburris.com.

Iva Ruth Cooper

February 28, 1922 - September 14, 2012