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OBIT: Mrs. Ruth Shoulders, Age 78, Of Tanglewood

Mrs. Ruth Shoulders, age 78 of the Tanglewood Community died at 5:22 a.m. Tuesday morning March 28, 2017 at the Riverview Regional Medical Center in Carthage suffering from respiratory failure. She was admitted March 24th from the Kindred Nursing and Rehabilitation Center where she had made her home since July 8, 2016 suffering from dementia.

Eld. Rickey Hall and Eld. Gary Drennon officiated at the 1 p.m. Thursday afternoon March 30th funeral services from the Carthage Chapel of Sanderson Funeral Home. Burial followed in the Pole Beasley Cemetery in the Graveltown Community.

Mrs. Shoulders was the fourth child of ten and the oldest daughter born to the late William Vasco Jones who died at the age of 94 on May 20, 1996 and Eva Delno Ethridge Jones who died at the age of 89 on March 17, 2002.

She was preceded in death by a sister, Eva Sandra Jones who died at the age of eleven days, also four brothers preceded her in death, Harold Eugene Jones, Melvin Lee Jones, Jimmy Gray Jones and Larry Wayne Jones.

On August 29, 1959, at the home of the late Tim and Elsie Shoulders in Carthage, she was united in marriage to Graveltown Community native Billy Joe Shoulders, now an ordained Missionary Baptist preacher and longtime church pastor. The ceremony was performed by the late Eld. L. O. Barclay.

They were preceded in death by their daughter, Jolonda Lynn Shoulders Smith who died November 19, 1992 at the age of 31.

Mrs. Shoulders was a 1957 graduate of Red Boiling Springs High School.

She was saved at the age of 22 in 1960 and was baptized into the full fellowship of the Mt. Tabor Missionary Baptist Church under the pastorate of then pastor Eld. Lewis O. Barclay. In 1965, she was transferred by letter to the Russell Hill Missionary Baptist Church where she remained a faithful member until her death.

Mrs. Shoulders retired in early 2016 as a pharmacy tech from the Smith County Drug Center where she had been employed since 1978.

In addition to her husband of over fifty eight years she is survived by their son, Shannon Shoulders of Tanglewood; grandson which they reared after the death of their daughter, Charles Smith and wife Sara of the Double Springs Community; three sisters, Retta Williams and husband Bobby of the Difficult Community, Rhonda Keisling and husband Mike of Hartsville, Rita Montgomery and husband Eddie of the Difficult Community; brother, John Paul Jones of Lebanon.

The Shoulders family requests memorials to the Pole Beasley Cemetery Mowing Fund.

SANDERSON of CARTHAGE