Ruth C. (Chicachee) Hughes

Ruth Chicachee Hughes, a native of Tarrytown died on March 30, 2018. She was a longtime resident of Tarrytown and a parishioner of the Carmelite Church of the Transfiguration. She was active in fund raising to build the school and the addition and the present church. She was a former lifetime member of the choir. Ruth was also a member of the Tarrytowners and Proud of It.

Mrs. Hughes was born in Tarrytown on August 4, 1921 to Frank and Edith Dahl Chicachee. Her father was also a native Tarrytowner. Her fraternal grandparents, who resided in the Heights, emigrated from Italy in 1885. Her mother came to Tarrytown in 1916 from Denmark.

She was educated in F.R. Pierson Elementary School and Washington Irving High School, graduating in 1938 at the age of sixteen. She was a hard working member of the Class of 1938 Reunion Committee. She attended the American Institute of Banking and was a graduate of the New York State Bankers School Estate and Trust Division Binghamton, New York.  She was Secretary to Ernest F. Griffin, a Tarrytown lawyer-historian and former Village President and was employed at the County Trust Company in Tarrytown before transferring to White Plains Trust Department, The Bank of New York as an Estate Administrator, retiring after 31 years. After retirement from the bank, Mrs. Hughes became personal secretary to Dr. Joseph Hughes, President of the County Trust Company for several years and was also secretary to General Council at the Olivetti Corporation in Tarrytown and several other prominent law firms.. In 1987, she moved to Cornwall-on-Hudson, New York where she worked for a local attorney and former County Legislator and then moved to Bradenton, Florida.

Mrs. Hughes is survived by her daughter, Maureen B. Neilson also of Bradenton, Florida and her son, James F. Hughes (Judy Darwick) of Ridgway, Colorado and granddaughter, Heather L. Valdez (James) and great-grandson, Justin James of Wappingers Falls, NY; all of whom were born in Tarrytown (five generations born in Tarrytown). She is also survived by her sister Ebba Chicachee Kadish of East Haven, CT and two nieces and five nephews. She was predeceased by her sister Vera Chicachee Speno.

Visitation will be at Coffey Funeral Home on Thursday April 12 from 2PM to 6PM. A Mass of Christian Burial will be celebrated at Transfiguration Church at 10:30 on Friday followed by committal services at Ferncliff Mausoleum.

In lieu of flowers, a remembrance to the Tarrytown Historical Society or Shriner’s Hospitals for Children would be appreciated.  

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