RUTH ELLA (BURNS) BONDS

Ruth Ella Bonds

November 12. 1925 – December 19, 2023

A bright light entered Osceola, Arkansas on November 12, 1925, when Randolph Edward and Mattie Bernice Phelps Burns welcomed their first child, a daughter they christened Ruth Ella.  They eventually moved to Chicago Heights, Illinois where Ruth Ella attended Washington Junior High School and then Bloom High School.  She loved music and sang in the choir, and she also participated in the archery club.

In 1946 she began a support career in academics as a secretary at Franklin Elementary School in Chicago Heights.  She excelled at her work and went on to become the administrative assistant to the Superintendent of the Board of Education for the Chicago Heights School District.

On June 6, 1948, she married her sweetheart Herbert Eugene Bonds, and they had a beautiful daughter, Patricia Irene Bonds.  Ruth Ella loved traveling and loved dogs, caring for many over the course of her life.

Ruth Ella is preceded in death by her parents, her four sisters: Ethrelda Burns Griffin, Irene Burns, Berline Shades Willingham and DeLois Shades Ferguson, two brothers: John Wesley Shades and Kenneth Shades, and her husband Herbert E. Bonds.

Ruth Ella was a joy to know and is deeply missed and mourned by her daughter, her nieces and nephews and her many friends.

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