Montreat, N.C. – Ruth Graham, who surrendered dreams of missionary work in Tibet to marry a suitor who became the world’s most renowned evangelist, died Thursday. She was 87.
Graham died at at her home, surrounded by her husband and their five children, said a statement by Larry Ross, Billy Graham’s spokesman.
“Ruth was my life partner, and we were called by God as a team,” Billy Graham said in a statement. “No one else could have borne the load that she carried. She was a vital and integral part of our ministry, and my work through the years would have been impossible without her encouragement and support.
“I am so grateful to the Lord that He gave me Ruth, and especially for these last few years we’ve had in the mountains together. We’ve rekindled the romance of our youth, and my love for her continued to grow deeper every day. I will miss her terribly, and look forward even more to the day I can join her in heaven.”
Ruth Graham had been bedridden for months with degenerative osteoarthritis of the back and neck – the result of a fall from a tree in 1974 while fixing a swing for grandchildren – and was treated for pneumonia two weeks ago. At her request, she had stopped receiving nutrients through a feeding tube for the last few days, Ross said.
The family plans a private interment and a public memorial service. Arrangements had yet to be made Thursday.
As Mrs. Billy Graham, Ruth Graham could lay claim to being the first lady of evangelical Protestantism, but neither exploited that unique status nor lusted for the limelight.
Behind the scenes, however, she was considered her husband’s closest confidant during his spectacular global career – one rivaled only by her father, L. Nelson Bell, until his death in 1973.
“She would help my father prepare his messages, listening with an attentive ear, and if she saw something that wasn’t right or heard something that she felt wasn’t as strong as it could be, she was a voice to strengthen this or eliminate that,” said her son, Franklin, who is now the head of the Billy Graham Evangelistic Association.
Bell, a missionary doctor, headed the Presbyterian hospital in Qingjiang, China, that had been founded by the father of author Pearl Buck. Ruth grew up there and spent three high school years in what is now North Korea.
Ruth Graham met many of the powerful and famous through her husband – who was a spiritual adviser to presidents for decades. President Bush and first lady Laura Bush called her a “remarkable woman of faith” who “inspired people around the world with her humor, intelligence, elegance and kindness.”
She met Billy Graham at Wheaton College in Illinois. He courted her, managing to coax her away from the foreign missions calling and into marriage after both graduated in 1943. In 1945, after a brief stint pastoring a suburban Chicago congregation, he became a roving speaker for the fledgling Youth for Christ organization.
From that point onward she had to endure her husband’s frequent absences, remarking, “I’d rather have a little of Bill than a lot of any other man.”
Ruth Graham moved the couple into her parents’ home in Montreat. The young couple later bought their own homes there. She stayed in the mountain town the rest of her life.
Due to her husband’s travels, she bore major responsibility for raising the couple’s five children.
She was the author or co-author of 14 books, including collections of poetry and the autobiographical scrapbook “Footprints of a Pilgrim.” In 1996, the Grahams were each awarded the Congressional Gold Medal for “outstanding and lasting contributions to morality, racial equality, family, philanthropy and religion.”
