Ruth Evangelina Garcia McElrath

Ruth Evangelina Garcia McElrath (23 May 1920 - 29 February 2016) was born in Buenos Aires, Argentina to Manuel Garcia Reiriz, a Baptist pastor who had emigrated from Spain, and Ines Cibils Cavers, whose mother had emigrated there from Scotland. Ruth travelled to the United States in 1940 to attend Blue Mountain College in Mississippi. She went on to earn masters degrees from the Carver School of Missions and Social Work and the School of Church Music at the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary in Louisville, Kentucky. In 1948, she married Hugh Thomas McElrath, who was a professor at the seminary music school for some 50 years. They were married for 60 years until his death in 2008. They served together as Ministers of Music at Beechwood Baptist Church for 26 years. Gregarious and energetic, Ruth was active as a teacher, choirmaster, mother of three, and supporter of classical music performance in Louisville. She continued that support by endowing two chairs in the Philharmonic Association’s Triangle Youth Philharmonic in North Carolina. She founded Friendship International, an educational and social organization serving expatriate spouses in Louisville. She and Hugh travelled extensively, including sabbatical years in Italy, England and Switzerland, visits to support Baptist missionaries, and leading international tours. They lived at Penney Retirement Community in Florida for some 20 years. For the last 20 months, she lived at Woodland Terrace in Cary to be closer to her children. She is survived by her sister Edith Moritz of Stone Mountain, Georgia: her brother Donaldo Garcia, of Ringwood, New Jersey; sons Hugh Donald and Douglas McElrath of Washington DC; daughter Margaret Partridge of Cary, North Carolina; and grandsons Hugh Dewitt McElrath and Jasper McElrath of Washington DC.

Funeral Services will take place at Broadway Baptist Church, Louisville, KY on Sunday, March 6th.