Published 5:48 pm Monday, June 10, 2024 By Natchez Obituaries Oct. 5, 1936 – June 8, 2024 NATCHEZ – Ruby Smith Dickerson, aged 87, formerly of Natchez, passed away peacefully at her residence in Starkville, MS on June 8, 2024, in the company of family and friends. Ruby was born on Oct.
5, 1936, in Red Lick, MS to Jesse Harvey Smith and Ruth Eugenia (Starnes) Smith. She was devoted to her husband and family, and she was a generous, kind woman with a merry heart and a great sense of humor. She truly worked hard and played hard, and was a lifelong lover of fun and adventure.
She often remarked in her last years, “I really enjoyed my life,” and it shows in the memories she created with those who knew and loved her. Ruby had a happy childhood growing up in the small communities of Red Lick, Dennis Crossroads, and Union Church, MS. After graduating high school, she attended Mississippi State College for Women and Mississippi College, where she graduated.
After college, she enjoyed a long, fulfilling career at Bellsouth as one of their first female building engineers, eventually retiring as a manager of building planning and engineering. In addition to her work in telecommunications, Ruby earned her private pilot’s certificate in 1963, and she delighted in her second career as a certified flight instructor. She loved teaching students how to fly, and she especially loved overturning the assumptions of the time that a little woman like her couldn’t possibly be the pilot! .