Ruth Madsen, age 83, of White, South Dakota, passed away quietly at the Brookings Hospital in Brookings, South Dakota, on Friday evening, September 29, 2006, after a courageous battle with cancer. Funeral services will be 10:30 A.M. Thursday, October 5, 2006, at Pioneer Lutheran Church near White, with interment in the church cemetery. Visitations will be from 6-8 P.M. Wednesday at the Eidsness Funeral Chapel in White. Ruth Evelyn (Hartley) Madsen was born April 14, 1923, to Blanche Mae Tyler and Benjamin Franklin Hartley, on the existing farm two miles south of White, South Dakota. She attended grades one through eight in Afton District 15, a mile and a quarter from home. She graduated from White High School in 1941, and attended Dakota State College in Madison, receiving a first grade certificate. She taught school from the fall of 1942 until the spring of 1946 in Afton District 106 and Argo District 27, two years in each. Ruth married Maurice LeRoy Madsen on June 2, 1946, and was thenafter a homemaker on their farm in Argo Township. Ruth and Maurice had five children: James, Lynette, Steven, Cheryl, and David. She shared a passion with Maurice to plant trees and shrubs to enhance wildlife on the farm. Collectively, they won many conservation awards, including National Tree Farm, Izaak Walton League state wildlife habitat award, and the South Dakota Wildlife Federations state forestry award. Her other passions included gardening, live animal trapping, music, quilting, needlework, working in the wood shop with Maurice, and being with her children and grandchildren. She was a member of Pioneer Lutheran Church. Survivors include four children: James (Barb) Madsen of Watertown, Lynette (Gary) Clasen of Brookings, Steven (Cindy) Madsen of Sandy, Utah, and Cheryl Madsen of Minneapolis; eleven grandchildren; three great-grandchildren; two brothers: Kenneth and Richard Hartley, both of White; two sisters: Lois (Wendell) Dunker of Davenport, Iowa, and Hazel (Delos) Dunker of Perryville, Missouri. She was preceded in death by her parents; husband in 2003; son David in 1950; brothers Robert, Chester, and George; and a sister, Dorothy Quissel.