Mrs. Minnie Lee Ryan

In Loving Memory Of Minnie Lee Ryan: Minnie Lee Ryan was born on January 1, 1923 in Laurel, Mississippi. She was the third of six children born to the late Chester and Lillie (Pugh) Buxton. Minnie spent her formative years in Heidelberg, Mississippi. She was educated in the Heidelberg public school system. As a child, Minnie was taken to church by her parents and was baptized at Jerusalem Baptist Church, in Heidelberg, under the leadership of the late Reverend Isaac Fair. While growing up, Minnie enjoyed tending to the family's flower garden and helping her mother prepare the family's meals. Flowers, cooking and baking would become Minnie's passions as an adult. As a young woman, Minnie moved to New Orleans, Louisiana. She met and married Aaron Cooper. To this union their daughter, Barbara Ann, was born. Minnie later married Alfred Ryan, Sr. They relocated to Houston, Texas, where their sons, Jewel (Butch) and Charles (Charlie), were born. In 1955, Alfred and Minnie stepped out on faith and moved to Detroit, Michigan. Utilizing the culinary and baking skills Minnie developed in Heidelberg and New Orleans, she was employed as a cook, for many years, at Red Run Golf Club, in Royal Oak, from where she retired. After retirement, she began baking her delicious cakes for the Motor City Soul Food Restaurant in Detroit. Minnie loved to cook for her family and friends of the family. As children, Butch and Charlie would fight to get to the kitchen table first to get Minnie's first stack of pancakes. Holiday dinners always included her famous New Orleans Creole gumbo, red velvet cake and five flavors cake. Minnie's pleasure was to feed you a home cooked meal and dessert prepared in her kitchen. Minnie was a soft-spoken woman with a gentle, kind and caring spirit. However, she was very adept at putting you in your place, if necessary. Minnie lived by the Golden Rule; she did unto others as she would have others do unto her. She treated people with dignity and respect and tried to make everyone who visited her home feel welcome, like family. Minnie always treated her children's friends as family and loved them as her own. Several of their friends have been part of the family for more than 50 years. Minnie valued family relationships. She would gather her small children and take them with her to visit their Ryan, Buxton and Pugh relatives in Detroit, Kansas City, Mississippi and New Orleans. In her later years, she especially enjoyed spending every winter visiting her sisters in New Orleans. She would stay in her New Orleans home until late spring, tending to her flower garden, and would return home with a box filled with her gumbo ingredients. Needless to say, her family welcomed her return. Minnie enjoyed her weekly lunch outings and occasional casino road trips with her three wonderful, longtime neighbors, Carrie Tharpe, and Benjamin and Ethel Salter. She also enjoyed visiting with her former neighbor and friend of over 50 years, Olympia Hardaway. Minnie Lee Ryan was truly a wonderful wife, mother, grandmother, great- grandmother, great-great-grandmother, sister, aunt, cousin and friend.

Mrs. Minnie Lee Ryan

January 1, 1923 - May 10, 2015