Ruby Hunt, the only child of a seamstress and railroad blacksmith, grew up off St. Paul’s West Seventh Street with a zest for leadership and civic life.

She served as valedictorian of Monroe High School in 1942 and later became president or chair of both the League of Women Voters and the St. Paul City Charter Commission, overseeing the creation of the city’s home rule charter — St. Paul’s constitution of sorts — during a fundamentally transformative time in city politics.

Ruby Hunt served on the St. Paul City Council for a decade before a dozen years of service as a Ramsey County Commissioner in the 1980s and ’90s. (Courtesy of Jane Hunt)

When Hunt won election to the St. Paul City Council in the early 1970s, she was only the third woman to do so since the city’s incorporation in 1854. A decade on the council led to her election to the Ramsey County County Board of Commissioners, where she would serve into the mid-1990s, for a total of nearly two dozen years in local elected office.

Hunt, who celebrated her 100th birthday in April, died of natural causes Saturday at Episcopal Homes on University Avenue, according to her daughter, Jane Hunt.

“Ruby Hunt was one of St. Paul’s greatest city council members,” said real estate developer John Mannillo, who would work closely with Hunt both in and outside of elected office. “She was probably the most influential woman that I knew in the city.”

From Panama Canal to City Hall

After the start of World War II, Hunt worked for the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers as an office clerk in the Panama Canal Zone, where she met her future husband, Richard Hunt, an electrical engineer, according to an obituary that Hunt penned for herself about five years ago.

After returning to St. Paul, Hunt became a Girl Scout leader, a stay-at-home mother to three daughters and later a foster mother to troubled teens, but her advocacy often drew her to City Hall.

Prior to the 1970s, city council members ran city departments themselves, with each elected official also doubling as an administrator. That allowed them to hire and fire city employees while determining which parts of the city would be prioritized to receive services. The system propped up “the classic neighborhood bigwig,” said Jane Hunt. “You had your personal favorites in your neighborhood. It was just ripe for fraud and cronyism.”

Under Ruby Hunt, the League of Women Voters and the city’s Charter Commission advocated for reform. Hunt helped oversee the process that created St. Paul’s home rule charter, which was approved by voters in 1970 and took effect in 1972. The charter defines the powers and responsibilities of the mayor and city council, laying out the foundation for the current “strong mayor” system in which the administration hires department leaders and the council approves the city budget.

“She ran for office as soon as it was adopted,” Jane Hunt said.

Ruby Hunt, third from left, pictured with other council members and Mayor George Latimer, from left: Bill Wilson, Vic Tedesco, Hunt, Latimer, Joanne Showalter, Len Levine, Ron Maddox and George McMann. (Courtesy of the Showalter family)

“It was a huge deal,” said former City Council President Kathy Lantry, interviewed in April. “She’s very ‘here’s the role of the council, here’s the role of the mayor, and if everyone stuck to their lane, everything would run smoothly.’ She was very process oriented. That’s why she did so well with the charter. … Everyone knew who Ruby was.”

Mannillo recalled Hunt’s engagement on issues ranging from anti-billboard campaigns to efforts to revitalize Lowertown, an area where she sometimes butted heads with then-Mayor George Latimer, who would become one of her closest confidantes.

Ramsey County Board

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After serving on the council from 1972 to 1982, including two years as council president, Hunt was elected to the Ramsey County Board of Commissioners, where she served from 1983 to 1995.

Joseph Errigo, former director of CommonBond Communities, recalled Hunt’s sometimes wry commentary.

“One of my favorite Ruby Hunt stories is the presentation to the council by a staff person who presented a lot of data, more than anyone could absorb,” said Errigo, in an email Tuesday. “Someone asked if it could be broken down by age and by sex. Ruby responded by saying she knew a lot of people who had been broken down by age, but she didn’t know of anyone who had been broken down by sex.”

Hunt played a role in establishing the position of Ramsey County manager, and in the transition of the St. Paul-Ramsey Medical Center in downtown St. Paul to become the privately run Regions Hospital.

Active in retirement

Hunt was a founding member of the long-running Friday lunch forums that still draw retired city leaders and others downtown each week to talk politics and civic life with special guests. Hunt was also a founding member of the civic group St. Paul Strong, which formed in 2015 to take a watchdog role on city policies during the administration of St. Paul Mayor Chris Coleman.

Hunt’s dedication to process and particulars didn’t always yield the intended results, and even gained her some ribbing on national cable television. In 2004, when bronze statues of “Peanuts” characters Peppermint Patty and Marcie were added to Rice Park, Hunt joined a group of protesters who demanded — unsuccessfully — that the city council relocate them. They argued that the statues clashed with that of famed writer F. Scott Fitzgerald.

The comedy show “The Daily Show With Jon Stewart” interviewed her at the time for a segment that lampooned her anti-“Peanuts” campaign, momentarily mortifying her family members, who later took some amusement from it.

In her latter years, Hunt moved into the Episcopal Homes apartments along the Green Line light rail corridor, where she counted Latimer among her neighbors. She would help fellow residents cast absentee ballots during elections, and sometimes joined other seniors in political protests outside her building, walker in hand, for street demonstrations against gun violence or national leaders she found unsavory.

Ruby Hunt, left, joins other senior citizens from Episcopal Homes in a protest of President Donald Trump’s inauguration on Jan. 20, 2017. (Jean Pieri Pioneer Press)

In 1994 she was named by the St. Paul Area Chamber of Commerce as its “Greatest Living Saint Paulite.” Hamline University gave her its first ‘Women in Public Service” award in 2012, and created the Ruby Hunt Endowed Scholarship for Public Administration in 2014. U.S. Rep. Betty McCollum entered her achievements into the official Congressional Record on Nov. 12 of that year.

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She was preceded in death by Richard Hunt, her husband of 60 years, and is survived by her daughters Lynn, Lee and Jane, as well as three grandchildren and one great-grandchild. Before entering politics, she also took in foster children, and remained in contact with three of them even in her latter years.

A memorial service is planned for 1 p.m. Jan. 17 at Gloria Dei Lutheran Church, 700 S. Snelling Ave. in St. Paul, with visitation beginning an hour earlier.

Memorials can be sent to Gloria Dei or the Ruby Hunt Scholarship, Hamline University, 1536 Hewitt Ave., St. Paul, 55104, or the Episcopal Homes Foundation, 490 E. Lynnhurst Ave, St. Paul, 55104.

Per her wishes, her body was donated to the University of Minnesota Anatomy Bequest Program.

“Even to the bitter end, she’s trying to serve others,” Jane Hunt said.