Ruth Richter Duncan of Portsmouth, Virginia, passed away Thursday afternoon, June 5th, 2014, in Loganville, Georgia, after a brief illness. She was born Ruth Emmy Richter in Kamen, Westfalia, Germany, on June 25th, 1922, the second child of Karl and Wilhelmina "Mimi" Richter. She was preceded in death by her husband of sixty-four years, Daniel Webster Duncan, her older sister, Edith Richter, her younger brother, Karl Richard "Dick" Richter, and her parents.

Before her third birthday, Ruth emigrated with her extended family from Germany to Filbert, West Virginia. Within a few years, the family moved again and settled in Winton Place in Cincinnati, Ohio. Ruth was educated in the public schools of Cincinnati, graduated from Hughes High School in 1940 with a degree in art, and became a naturalized citizen of the United States of America. Despite the tribulations of the Great Depression, historic floods within a few blocks of her home, and an industrial accident that critically injured her father, Ruth always described her childhood as happy and full of upstanding role models from whom she learned adaptability, the power of positive attitude, and the value of hard work, family and community.

Ruth and Dan met when both were employed in the Research and Development department at Procter & Gamble. They wed on April 11th, 1947, and relocated to Portsmouth, where Mr. Duncan had accepted an engineering position at the Virginia Smelting Company in West Norfolk (later, Virginia Chemicals, Inc.). Mrs. Duncan immersed herself in her newly adopted community, which became her home for more than sixty years. A devoted housewife and mother of four, she kept up with a perpetual influx of kids, friends, parents, relatives, and houseguests. She ran the household with a spirit of adventurous experimentation; for example, she was always willing to cook up whatever the family brought home, at least once. She encouraged the keeping of a wide variety of pets, but she drew the line at mice; they were restricted to the garage. She was a den mother to many Cub Scouts and Girl Scouts in the area – she drove countless young scouts' Saturday-morning Krispy-Kreme delivery routes – and she served in multiple roles in her children's schools, including as president of the Port Norfolk Elementary School PTA. Mrs. Duncan was a frequent blood donor for the American Red Cross. She invested considerable time and effort toward the success of the Evening Department of The Women's Club of Portsmouth, serving as president and in other roles, and she played monthly in the same bridge club for several decades. While keeping up with an already full schedule, Mrs. Duncan actively participated in many of her husband's business and civic obligations.

She was a long-time member of the Spade and Trowel Garden Club where she combined her abilities in art with her knowledge of ornamental gardening to produce award-winning flower arrangements for judged competitions. As a measure of her skill integrating dissimilar media, one of her more noteworthy arrangements combined a budding forsythia branch with parts from an automobile bumper jack. She was an early supporter of the Virginia Opera and she was a founding member of the Tidewater Virginia Chapter of the Embroiderers' Guild of America; she edited the chapter's newsletter for many years. Ruth loved to learn new things, and through the Embroiderers' Guild she studied a wide variety of needlework and fiber-related techniques: embroidery, needlepoint, cross-stitch, quilting, beading, basketry, and more. She attended embroidery classes at the Royal Danish Academy in Copenhagen and studied with the masters in fiber-arts classes across the US and in Japan. Beyond the mere works of physical art she created, the real hallmarks of her interactions in every group she joined were the multitude of abiding friendships – such as "The Stitching Sisters" – that flourished long after the events had concluded.

But for all her involvement in the arts and local community, nowhere was she happier than in her garden. The intensity of her love for plants was obvious, and her yard and garden reflected her eclectic interests in organic gardening and ornamental plants. Ruth and Dan cultivated a wide variety of summer vegetables and fruit which they readily shared with friends. The garden is still producing blueberries, asparagus, kiwi fruit, raspberries and blackberries, and every year the azaleas, wisteria, roses, camellias, and irises continue to bloom. After nearly fifty years of her loving attention, the soil in her garden rivals the finest dirt anywhere.

Mrs. Duncan is survived by a daughter, Janet D. David (Wayne) of Loganville, Georgia; three sons, Thomas K. Duncan (Janet) of Falmouth, Massachusetts, Robert A. Duncan (Frances) of Atlanta, Georgia, and James N. Duncan (Dianne Saunders) of Raleigh, North Carolina; nine grandchildren, Melissa Streitenberger (Eric), Michael David, Andrew Duncan, Benjamin Duncan, Daniel Duncan, John Duncan, Caroline Duncan, Ellen Saunders Duncan, and Valerie Saunders Duncan; and a great-granddaughter, Kate Streitenberger. Mrs. Duncan is also survived by a niece, Suzan Witt (Michael), and a nephew, Ryan Richter (Katie), both of Cincinnati, Ohio.

Visitation with the family will be held Friday, June 13th from 5:00 to 7:30 p.m. at Foster Funeral Home, 1926 High St., Portsmouth. A graveside service will be held at Olive Branch Cemetery, Clifford Street at City Park Avenue in Portsmouth, on Saturday, June 14th at 11:00 a.m., with Dr. L. Wilbur Kersey officiating. Foster Funeral Home, Portsmouth, is directing. In lieu of flowers, donations may be made to the Children's Museum of Virginia, 221 High Street, Portsmouth VA 23704, and the Churchland YMCA, 4900 High Street West, Portsmouth VA 23703. The family is thankful for the loving care provided by Terri Madden of Portsmouth, Virginia, Lori Christopher of Snellville, Georgia, and the staff of Southern Plantation and Legacy Court in Loganville, Georgia, and Abbey Hospice in Social Circle, Georgia.