Joy Ruth C. Fertitta

Published 12:00 am Sunday, May 20, 2018

A Mass of Christian Burial for Joy Ruth Cadwallader Fertitta, will be held at 11 A.M. on Monday, May 28, 2018, at St. Margaret Mary Catholic Church in Slidell, with Father Ed Grice officiating. 

Visitation with family and friends will be in the church beginning at 10 A.M. Due to the Memorial Day holiday, interment will follow on Tuesday at 10 a.m. at Forest Lawn Cemetery. 

Joy passed away peacefully surrounded by her loving family on Saturday, May 12, 2018, at Garden View Assisted Living in New Iberia.

Joy Ruth was born to Miles E. Cadwallader Sr. and Fay Susan Babbitt Cadwallader on April 8, 1923, at the Cadwallader Family Farm near Oxford, Nebraska. Except for three years (1924-1927) when her father served as superintendent of Republican City Schools, the farm remained in the family for another generation to call it home.

Joy and her siblings were children of the Great Depression in the Mid-West. The grimness of that period was compounded by severe drought, the “Dust Bowl” years, grasshopper swarms, the Republican River Flood of 1935 and eventually World War II. Somehow through perseverance and the strong love and guidance of their parents, they all managed to overcome this adversity.

Joy was the last surviving member of her 1940 graduating class of Oxford High School. 

After earning a teaching degree at Kearney State Teachers College, Joy accompanied friends to California. She worked for Douglas Aircraft in El Segundo, serving as an iconic “Rosie the Riveter,” building Douglas SBD (Scout Bomber Douglas) Dauntless which was a World War II American naval scout plane and dive bomber used by the U. S. Navy and the U. S. Marines in the South Pacific. At the end of the war, she was employed at the Los Angeles branch of the Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco. During that time, she met and married her husband, Salvador William Fertitta, of Laurel, Mississippi, who was serving with the U. S. Army. 

She taught at Abney Elementary School in Slidell and completed her teaching career on the staff of Bonne Ecole Elementary School. After retirement from teaching, she was very involved as a member of the Daughters of the American Revolution, the Colonial Dames of the Seventeenth Century, the Daughters of the War of 1812 and the Bayou Liberty Garden Club. She was also involved in her community as a friend of the Slidell Public Library and a member of St. Margaret Mary Catholic Church.

She is survived by her daughter Jean Fertitta Reaux and her husband, Ebrar, of New Iberia; her two sons Paul Fertitta and his wife, Mary, of Dallas, Georgia and Robert Fertitta and his wife, Annette, of Gulfport, Mississippi; sisters Maxine Moran of Salt Lake City, Utah, Lois Wells of Eau Claire, Wisconsin; brother Joe Cadwallader and wife, Maria, of Spokane, Washinton; nine grandchildren Paul A. Reaux and his wife, Angel, Ashley Reaux Orduña, Michael Reaux, Paul Ross Reaux and his wife, Ashley, Charleen Fertitta Knox and her husband, Mike, Joshua Fertitta, David Fertitta, Amy Fertitta and Emily Fertitta; and eight great-grandchildren Caitlyn Reaux, Catherine Reaux, Caroline Reaux, Lilly Reaux, Olivia Orduña, Brett Trahan, Alexis Trahan and Hunter Chesson.

She was predeceased by her husband; her parents; her daughter Susan Rebecca Fertitta; and her brother Miles E. Cadwallader Jr.  

Joy was an avid reader and always seemed to have a book in her hand. The family suggests that memorial gifts be made in her honor to the Bonne Ecole Elementary School Library, 900 Rue Verand, Slidell, LA 70458, for the purchase of library books.

Her family would like to thank the staff of Garden View Assisted Living for the loving care and respect she received from each staff member and also the staff of NSI Hospice for their professional assistance and care in her final days.

To view guestbook go to www.acadianfuneralhome.net.  

Acadian Funeral Home of New Iberia has been entrusted with handling the arrangements, 802 Weldon St., 364-6162.