Ruth Sloan Sumner

MOULTRIE, GA - Ruth Sumner, 83, of Moultrie passed on Monday, February 3rd after an extended illness. 

Funeral services will be held at 2:00 PM Thursday, February 6, 2025, at Cobb Funeral Chapel with Mr. Jerry Tillman officiating. Interment will be in Midway Freewill Baptist Church Cemetery. 

The family will receive friends from 1:00-1:45PM Thursday at Cobb Funeral Chapel. 

Born on November 19, 1941, as Emma Ruth Sloan to Walter & Nona Mae Sloan. She was the 2nd of 6 children who grew up together on a farm on the Lower Meigs Road. They all ‘worked the fields’ before and after school; she had a story or two about hanging and curing tobacco and some not-so-fond stories about picking cotton. Four of the siblings still live in Moultrie while baby sister, Bonnie, resides in Tifton. Ruth grew up at Funston Elementary school. She enjoyed Bible Camp, dabbling with various art projects, and going to Tucker’s roller-skating rink. She grew up with a lung condition which caused her to have a lung removed while she was still in high school. Although she was never a smoker, she dealt with chronic COPD for years. 

Ruth has always been a people person and she never met a stranger. Many people still know and remember her from her time as a hostess at the Golden Corral. This is where she met ‘her Charlie.’ Ruth and Charlie married in May of 1982. They were members at Moultrie Freewill and then Grace Freewill Baptist Church throughout their 33 years together. Before retiring in 2014, Ruth served as a people-greeter at Wal-Mart. She enjoyed light gardening, enjoyed reading magazines, and always enjoyed a cup of good coffee. Ruth will always be remembered as a compassionate, caring, sweet woman with a “little Sloan sass”. 

Ruth had two children, Tony & Teresa. Tony seemed to inherit her health problems, and he passed away at the tender young age of 14. Teresa Gassett grew up in Moultrie and graduated CCHS in 1983. Teresa recently retired after 31 years of teaching general and choral music. Teresa and her husband, Jimmy, live in Auburn, Alabama. During Ruth’s last years, Teresa often described her mother as “The spirit is willing, but the flesh is weak.” Now she is healed and whole.

Ruth leaves behind her daughter Teresa Rhyne (Jimmy), her sisters Betty Burdette, Mary Taylor, and Bonnie Cwiek, and her brothers Larry Sloan and Ray Sloan as well as multiple nieces and nephews, and other extended family members. She was pre-deceased by her parents, Walter and Nona Mae Sloan; her first-born, Tony Ray Crosby, and her late husband, Charlie Sumner.

In lieu of flowers, memorial contributions may be made to your local Food Bank in memory of Mrs. Ruth. 

Cobb Funeral Chapel has been entrusted with arrangements.