Teacher always saw positive side of life

10/21/2005

Ruth Russell Jacobs, 90, formerly of Walbridge, a retired longtime Lake Local schools teacher, died of an apparent stroke yesterday in the Otterbein Portage Valley Retirement Community, Pemberville, Ohio.

Mrs. Jacobs, herself a Lake Local graduate who had associate's and bachelor's degrees in education from Bowling Green State University, taught kindergarten and second grade in the district from 1933 until her retirement in 1971.

In retirement, she tutored children with learning disabilities and her own grandchildren until two years ago, when her health deteriorated.

Mrs. Jacobs, a native of the Millbury area, married Raymond Jacobs in 1938 and settled in Millbury. Mr. Jacobs died in 2002.

"My mother was probably the most positive, giving person I ever met in my life," her son, James Jacobs, said. "The glass was always full for her. She would tell me, 'If you think you can do it, then go do it.'●"

Mrs. Jacobs was a lifelong member of St. Paul's United Methodist Church, Millbury, where she led the children's choir for many years, was a Sunday school teacher, and was in charge of the vacation Bible school program.

Surviving are her son, James Jacobs; daughters, Marilyn Baker, a former Wood County commissioner, and Jean Waggoner; brothers, George Russell and L. Donald Russell; sisters, Florence Klinepeter, Eleanor Knerr, and Verla Albring; six grandchildren, and eight great-grandchildren.

Services will be at 2:30 p.m. Sunday at St. Paul's United Methodist Church, Millbury. Visitation will be after 2 p.m. tomorrow in the Marsh Funeral Home, Luckey, Ohio, and after 1:30 p.m. Sunday at St. Paul's.

The family suggests tributes to St. Paul's United Methodist Church.