ALTAMONT — Born on a Hilltown farm, Ruth E. Quay was a loving homemaker and devoted mother. Late in life, she ranched in New Mexico before returning to the Helderbergs, which she loved.

She died on Thursday, June 25, 2015, during a brief stay at the Albany County Nursing Home. She was 77 years old.

“Ruth was always a hard worker who eagerly pursued many projects in and around the home,” her family wrote in a tribute.

Born to Fred and Bertha (née Norman) Tubbs in Berne on Dec. 9, 1937 on the Tubbs family farm on West Mountain, Mrs. Quay had many fond childhood memories of life on the farm and often recounted the changes when her large family moved “down off the mountain” to Street Road in Township.

“Ruth was probably the first in her family to graduate from high school, Berne-Knox-Westerlo circa 1955,” her family wrote.

She worked briefly as a secretary at General Electric and, in 1958, married Robert Quay, an engineer with General Electric. The young couple lived in Rotterdam for several years where their three children — Jeffrey, John, and Susan — were born.

They moved to the Bellevue neighborhood in Schenectady in about 1964 and raised their children there. The Quays were active in the Trinity Reformed Church in Rotterdam throughout the 1960s and 1970s. Mrs. Quay was a Cub Scout den mother when her boys were young.

When the kids had grown and Mr. Quay had retired, the couple moved to San Jon, New Mexico in the 1990s. Mrs. Quay was hard at work again, transforming an old adobe ranch house into an attractive modern home with a small working cattle ranch. After several years of ranching and farming in the southwest, the Quays returned to their roots in the Helderbergs.

“They lived in Altamont,” her family wrote, “in the land they cherished and near the families they loved.”

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Ruth E. Quay is survived by her sons, Jeffrey Quay of Dripping Springs, Texas and John Quay of Greenville, South Carolina; two grandsons, Michael and John; her, brother Richard Tubbs, and her sisters, Gloria White, Rose Tymann, and Donna McGill.

Her husband, Robert, died before her as did her daughter, Susan; her parents; and her siblings, Merlin, Leonard, Lewis, Evelyn, and Gladys.

Calling hours and a service were held on Tuesday, June 30, at the Fredendall Funeral Home in Altamont with interment at the Knox Cemetery. Online condolences may be made at www.fredendallfuneralhome.com.