Ruby D. Olsen

Ruby Pearl Olsen (Dail) 90, passed peacefully on February 22, 2012 at Lely ManorCare, Naples, FL. The family wishes to thank Lely ManorCare and Staff of Thalia Unit for taking such good care of her for the past three years.

Ruby was born September 12, 1921 in Weeksville, NC. She grew up on the family farm along the Pasquotank River. She remembered her childhood fondly and always said, "I couldn't wait to get off the farm, but I spent the rest of my life trying to get back to it". She graduated from Weeksville High School where she was a star basketball player, her team capturing many State championships. Ruby was a snappy dresser and was chosen Best Dressed Girl in her graduating class.

When Ruby was 18, she and her sister, Evelyn, known as "The Dail Sisters", performed with their band all around Eastern North Carolina. They also regularly sang on the radio.

World War II broke out, Ruby went to work at the shipyards in Norfolk, VA. There she met the love of her life, a dashing young airman named Robert (Bob). They were married on Friday the 13th, 1944, beginning her 33-year career as an Air Force wife.

Bob and Ruby had four children, Robert, Susan, Paul, and Elizabeth. They were transferred to Miami, FL (Homestead Air Force Base) in 1960.

Ruby quickly embraced the South Florida lifestyle. She loved fishing, boating, gardening, sailing, and camping, always with her family by her side. With Bob's encouragement, Ruby became an accomplished cook, able to prepare any type of cuisine, to the delight of her husband and children. Ruby and Bob were wonderful dancers and would clear the dance floor at the Homestead Air Force Base NCO Club. She loved children and any type of animal. Their home in Miami was routinely full of both. Ruby always stood up for the underdog and downtrodden. No matter who it was - she was quickly there for them, like "white on rice".

Hurricane Andrew blew their Miami life away in 1992. Now in their 70s, Ruby and Bob relocated to Satellite Beach, FL, and spent the next 14 years loving every minute of this new chapter of their life.

Ruby is survived by her daughters, Susan Buckley of Naples, and Elizabeth Beese of Palm Coast, FL. She has four grandchildren whom she also loved dearly, Andria, Nickolas, Wendy, and Stephen.

Loving wife, devoted mother, devote Catholic, feisty and still singing until the very last, hers was a life well lived.

Ruby will be laid to rest next to her beloved Bob on Monday, February 27, 2012 at Florida Memorial Funeral Home and Gardens, Rockledge, FL.