Birth date: Nov 27, 1927 Death date: Mar 29, 2019
Ruth Arcadia Loche of Tulsa, Oklahoma passed from this life on March 29, 2019 at the age of 91.Ruth was born on November 27, 1927 in Tulsa, OK, number four of eight children to Oreb and Eula Loche, and was the epitome of a hard-sc Read Obituary
Couldn’t say it any better twin brother Garry. Two of those slot machines are displayed in my living room and my youngest daughter has one in her home. Ruth was one of those people that you instantly liked when she walked up to our table at Tulsa gun show. As for the gun she had her in her pocket, it was only a two shot Derringer and I asked her which one of us she was going to pistol whip after shooting the other two. What a fine lady.
Met Ruth at the Tulsa Gun show. Three of us went to her house that evening to buy slot machines. The next day at the show I mentioned she was pretty brave to let three men in her house. She told me she had a gun in her pocket. The next year after the show on Saturday Ruth and her sister went with my twin brother me to super. Some time later I called Ruth to find her phone not working. Concerned I remember she had told me she owned a printing shop. After some Searching I found the Business and called then to Inquire about Ruth's well being. They were very Illusive about her whereabouts or Condition. This made me concerned and I told them I was going to call the police and have a welfare check done at her residence. At that point they told me they would have her call me.
Ruth was in Texas fishing.
And when she called me later that afternoon we both had a little chuckle about it. Her family thought I was trying to extort money from her. My only regret was not knowing Ruth longer before her passing. Garry Avery Springfield, Mo.
SO SORRY TO HEAR ABOUT RUTH A GOOD FRIEND WE ATTENDED MANY SAMBOREES TOGETHER SHE WILL BE MISS. I HAVE A CHRISTMAS ORNIMATE SIGNED BY HER ALWAYS TREASURE
Ruth was the Red headed girl playing marbles in the alleys of Tulsa, when Norman Rockwell noticed the kids. This is one of Norman’s painting that was on the front cover of Saturday Evening Post September 2, 1939. She was a long time member of Good Sams. She was one of 8 children She shoots, she scores! KELLY KERR / Tulsa World Jun 26, 2004 Former Tulsa marbles champ Ruth Loche recreates with Terry Stephenson (center) and Cliff Mitchell a moment that was captured by Norman Rockwell in the famous 1939 cover of the Saturday Evening Post. KELLY KERR / Tulsa World Former Tulsa marble champion remembers Rockwell, ‘Ripley’s’ Above a table just inside the Tulsa home of Ruth Loche, there’s a bamboo print of one of the most iconic paintings Norman Rockwell ever created. Taken from a Saturday Evening Post cover, it depicts a young girl with a pile of marbles beside her, getting ready to make another shot as two boys — her competitors — look on with bewilderment. “I probably had a pocketful, too,” says Loche with a laugh. “I kept the pockets torn off my dresses.” The girl in the picture is Loche herself — or, at least, Norman Rockwell’s rendition of her. Robert Ripley also drew a young Loche for an installment of his “Ripley’s Believe It or Not,” back when that feature was a wildly popular part of many newspaper comics pages. That was in 1943, four years after the Post cover. The reason for the sudden popularity of Loche’s image? As a 12-year-old, she beat 300 boys to earn the title of Tulsa’s marble champion in a competition sponsored by Lowell Elementary School. “I had an older brother, two years older than myself, and whatever he did, I did,” she explained. “If he was out playing marbles, I was out playing marbles. If he was playing ball, I was playing ball. I did a lot of boy things because of him.” But in the final analysis, he turned out to be just one of the kids she bested in the marble competition, a yearly event sponsored by the school back when marble-playing was a major pastime of America’s youth. “I got a little crown, but that was it,” she added. “That was during the Depression, and you didn’t win anything. I won about five or six years in a row, starting back when I was in the fourth grade, and I always got that little crown.” The Tulsa World ran a photo from her early triumph, and someone else — she figures it was a school official — took other pictures, one of which found its way to Norman Rockwell. While the Ripley organization notified her about her appearance in “Ripley’s Believe It or Not” — which was carried in the World at the time — she said she didn’t know about the 1939 Post cover until the late ’80s. “A friend of mine found it and brought it over to me,” she remembered. “She said, ‘This is you.’ We contacted Curtis Publishing Company (which published the Saturday Evening Post), and they verified over the phone that it was me.” Given the continued popularity of Rockwell’s work, Loche’s image has shown up in prints, collectors’ plates and even figurines. She’s never received any money for any of it, but that doesn’t bother her in the least. “No, back then they didn’t give royalties or anything, and I don’t expect anything,” she said. “It’s just part of living.” In the marble-collector world, however, Loche is a celebrity. In the words of Cliff Mitchell, president of the Tulsa Marble Club, “She’s one of the most recognizable symbols of marble competition. Every marble collector in America has a copy of that picture.” Mitchell and Loche met about three years ago at a marble auction in Kansas. “She had a copy of the ‘Ripley’s Believe It or Not’ cartoon, and she signed it for me,” he recalled. “Later on, I started wondering if she’d come out to the club and tell us about her experiences.” Sure enough, she did, and now she’ll be at the club’s annual convention Saturday — that’s today — talking about marbles and signing autographs. Her autographs will cost $2 each, with all the proceeds split between the Tulsa Marble Club and mission efforts at the Ranch Acres Baptist Church. “We’ll also have a marble-identificati
Ruth Loche, was one of the sweetest people I ever met. I met Ruth about 1994 or thereabouts, at an RV Rally. I was a member with Will Rogers Sam’s and she was a member of another group. The thing I remember the most about Ruth she was quite the game player; and hardly anyone was able to beat her. We lost contact for several years, until this year 2019 my husband & i became Chaplain’s at River Ranch Resort. The very first Sunday of our services here walks in Ruth…I looked at her and she at me and I said to her, don’t I know you from someplace. It did not take us long to remember where we knew each other from. I will miss her sweet smiling face.
Rest in Peace my sweet friend and we will meet again one day soon!
Shairon
