Post Falls woman remembered for adventurous, free spirit

Ruth Stafford’s life defined the term “free spirit.”

The Post Falls resident was a mother, seamstress, writer, member of an “Indian” clan, baker, pilot, bookkeeper, newspaper carrier, baby sitter, home health aide and a waitress.

And withal, she was a happy person when, at age 75, she died of cancer on Nov. 16.

Her son, Tom, also of Post Falls, says a principle tenet of her life was her refusal to work for anyone.

Born in Lynn, Mass., in 1929, Ruth spent her early years there. In an autobiography saved by her daughter, Laura Weins, of Colorado Springs, Ruth wrote, “We never had a yard but once.

“Tenement buildings seldom do. A born nature lover, I would have withered like a spring flower if it wasn’t for my grandparents’ home on the outskirts of a small town, several hours away.

“I was generally sent there for the summer, where I ran free as the wind with my cousins, and explored every inch of that 10 acres.”

At home, her passion was books, which, she wrote, “I didn’t read, I lived them. I learned to survive in the North Woods, sailed a schooner around the Horn, went West by covered wagon.”

At age 12, Ruth spent a year with her grandparents. Without access to a library, she began writing prose and poetry. It was a hobby she kept up throughout her life.

In fact, during her last years, she was a member of the Corbin Senior Writers’ Workshop in Spokane and the Spokane Authors’ Self Publishers.

From Ruth’s earliest years, she had many dreams, according to her son. One of those was flying an airplane.

Barely 17 and just out of high school, she began flying lessons.

“By this time, I was the sole supporter of my parents, working six days a week and most evenings,” she wrote.

“I turned over all but $3.25 of my weekly pay. A quarter took me by bus to within a mile of the airport, and the remaining $3 was plunked down on the counter as I asked for ‘fifteen minutes of instruction, please.’ “

Ruth attained her license at age 18, joined the Women’s Civil Air Patrol and eventually was promoted to sergeant. She bought a used Taylorcraft airplane without a “skin” and, on a sewing machine, fabricated a cloth cover for the aircraft, which she and a friend doped and painted.

Among her children’s souvenirs of their mother’s adventurous life is a clipping from the Feb. 14, 1948, Boston Globe, which tells of a forced landing after she became lost, then her plane ran low on gasoline.

Beneath the headline, “Girl Flyer in Forced Landing on Farm,” the reporter wrote, “The pretty pilot told State Police that she attempted to land on the broad roadway of Route 1A when the motor of her single-engine plane conked out, but she did not have enough altitude.

“The undercarriage caught and broke telephone lines. The right wing sheared off when it caught on a pine tree.”

Ruth and a passenger walked away from the wreck.

At age 25, with her parents eligible for Social Security, she left for California, “the golden land of perpetual summer,” as she wrote.

“My means of getting there was an old car, a gas credit card, $100 and supreme optimism. Arriving in Los Angeles with $15 left in my pocket, I was lucky enough to find a job that first day and an apartment with an understanding landlady.”

She worked as a waitress in Hollywood for three years then, “upon discovering the beauty of the Monterey Peninsula,” she moved to Carmel where she met a house painter while working as a waitress in the Carmel Creamery. She married him and bore three children, Tom, Laura and Karen.

Divorced in 1970, her heart responded to the strains of a then-popular Doris Day song, “Old Cape Cod,” so she pulled up stakes, packed her teenage kids into her Datsun station wagon and drove back East.

There, she supported her young brood by baby-sitting, bookkeeping and delivering newspapers. There also she fell in with members of the Bear Tribe, described by her son as a pseudo-Indian group.

During the next five years her children married and moved out on their own. She missed the West, so she moved across country again, this time to Tumtum, Wash., and Vision Mountain, headquarters for the Bear Tribe Medicine Society for which she worked as a bookkeeper.

“It was a ‘get back to nature thing for her,’ ” says son Tom. “The tribe had shamans, and sweat lodges which, if you stay in them long enough, will apparently give you visions.”

Joan Frasier of Coeur d’Alene, who roomed with Ruth during that period, says her Bear Tribe name was “Blue Camas.”

Ruth, she recounts, became a leader in her group, performed “vision quests” and was a “pipe carrier” in the tribe’s services for deceased members.

“She was so sweet and could relate to people of all ages,” Frasier says. “She took care of folks in their 70s and 80s, doing their cleaning, cooking, clothes washing, ironing, and even helped them shower.

“To earn a living, she did all sorts of clothing alterations, sold baked goods and candy, did bookkeeping and was a house -sitter.

“She never had much money,” Frasier says, “but she always found some to give to animal charities. She usually had four or five cats and a dog living with her.”

In her last few years, Ruth supplemented her income by selling Native American smudge sticks, sage and sweet grass. She started square dancing and was working on a mystery story when she died, “going in all directions at once, as usual,” according to son Tom.

Near the end of her days, Ruth wrote what might have been her own eulogy: “I am finally learning to play this game called ‘life’ as it should be played – with a light step and a song in my heart. And why not? I am living my dreams. What more could one ask for?”