Delia Collins Ruttkey (Mrs. Louis) President 1889-1890

A tribute written by Mrs. A.L. Frisbee - 

Delia Collins Ruttkey, daughter of Commodore Collins, was president of the Women’s Club in 1889-1890.  When taking a voyage on her father’s steamship line, she met the nephew of Louis Kossuth of the royal family of Hungary.  After coming to Des Moines to live his health failed and Dr. Dickinson said of him “It is a pretty hard thing when a man makes up his mind that there is one too many and he is that man.”  She conducted for years in Des Moines a class of Shakespeare and occupied herself in many intellectual pursuits.  Although her family had given her much she respected herself for what she was, not what she had.

She was an unusually good looking woman, tall, broad shouldered, rather haughty carriage, wearing her clothes with great dignity.  Her dark eyes were keen and bright, her face expressive and her heart responsive.  Her life was filled with sorrow and those of us who remember her invariably recall her white, pale face, surrounded by a long black mourning-veil

Miss. Anne Coggill Ruttkey 12 Summer St. Augusta M, Atlanta Ga., is her daughter who carries on the intellectual status to which she was born.

The wife of Commodore Collins, Lucy B. Collins, (Delia’s mother) is the first one mentioned on the In Memoriam of the Des Moines Women’s Club. She died in 1887.  Mrs. Robert Coskery, her granddaughter, has lately made a loan of six of her valuable original paintings of the old masters.  She is an honorary member of the club.