# Ruth Coker Burks, the cemetery angel. **URL:** \ **Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share\ **Created:** [July 16, 2017, 11:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ruth-coker-burks-the-cemetery-angel/791386 "2017-07-16T11:14:30Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 15\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Foggy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/foggy/32/1082_2.png) [@Foggy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Foggy)\ **Post date:** [July 16, 2017, 11:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ruth-coker-burks-the-cemetery-angel/791386/1 "2017-07-16T11:14:30Z")
This is from January 2015. It is a difficult read, I haven’t read all of it yet. [Ruth Coker Burks, the cemetery angel.](https://m.arktimes.com/arkansas/ruth-coker-burks-the-cemetery-angel/Content?oid=3602959) > [@](#): > > In the darkest hour of the AIDS epidemic, Ruth Coker Burks cared for hundreds of people whose families had abandoned them. Courage, love and the 30-year secret of one little graveyard in Hot Springs. > [@](#): > > One person who found the courage to push the wheel is Ruth Coker Burks. Now a grandmother living a quiet life in Rogers, in the mid-1980s Burks took it as a calling to care for people with AIDS at the dawn of the epidemic, when survival from diagnosis to death was sometimes measured in weeks. For about a decade, between 1984 and the mid-1990s and before better HIV drugs and more enlightened medical care for AIDS patients effectively rendered her obsolete, Burks cared for hundreds of dying people, many of them gay men who had been abandoned by their families. She had no medical training, but she took them to their appointments, picked up their medications, helped them fill out forms for assistance, and talked them through their despair. Sometimes she paid for their cremations. She buried over three dozen of them with her own two hands, after their families refused to claim their bodies. For many of those people, she is now the only person who knows the location of their graves. This is where I’m supposed to say something like “Faith in Humanity Restored!”, but being me, I can’t help feeling angry that Ruth had to do so much because others, who should have, refused to do anything. Why is it some, like Ruth, used her religious beliefs to help people, while so many others were using it to hate and to condemn people with AIDS. Stupid question, I know. ---
**Author:** ![Evan\_Drake](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/b487fb/32.png) [@Evan\_Drake](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Evan_Drake)\ **Post date:** [July 16, 2017, 11:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ruth-coker-burks-the-cemetery-angel/791386/2 "2017-07-16T11:43:13Z")
Isn’t that a bit like asking why do some true communists slave people in camps to die whilst other true communists live like saints ? The creed doesn’t define the man. ---
**Author:** ![Foggy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/foggy/32/1082_2.png) [@Foggy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Foggy)\ **Post date:** [July 16, 2017, 12:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ruth-coker-burks-the-cemetery-angel/791386/3 "2017-07-16T12:09:14Z")
> [@Evan\_Drake](#): > > Isn’t that a bit like asking why do some true communists slave people in camps to die whilst other true communists live like saints ? > The creed doesn’t define the man. Well, I did say it was a stupid question.☹ ---
**Author:** ![Lucas\_Jackson](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lucas_jackson/32/303_2.png) [@Lucas\_Jackson](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lucas_Jackson)\ **Post date:** [July 16, 2017, 2:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ruth-coker-burks-the-cemetery-angel/791386/4 "2017-07-16T14:08:23Z")
> [@Foggy](#): > > This is where I’m supposed to say something like “Faith in Humanity Restored!”, but being me, I can’t help feeling angry that Ruth had to do so much because **others, who should have** , refused to do anything. Bolding mine. I applaud Ruth and her efforts but I gotta ask, what are you doing for people with AIDS? ---
**Author:** ![Foggy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/foggy/32/1082_2.png) [@Foggy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Foggy)\ **Post date:** [July 16, 2017, 6:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ruth-coker-burks-the-cemetery-angel/791386/5 "2017-07-16T18:58:39Z")
> [@Lucas\_Jackson](#): > > Bolding mine. > I applaud Ruth and her efforts but I gotta ask, what are you doing for people with AIDS? Today? Nothing. In the early 80’s I was at one of the first Candle Light Marches in L.A., I attended several more over the years. I donated money when I could, which wasn’t very often. I volunteer with STOP AIDS L.A. several times. In '86 I marched with STOP AIDS L.A. in the Gay Pride Parade. I also put up with a lot of crap from family, friends, and coworkers about being gay. (Lots of gay people had to deal with a lot worst.) In '95 I moved to San Francisco, I did a number of 1day/ short term volunteer events for different AIDS groups. I could have/should have done more. My mental heath issues have FUBAR ever aspect of my life for decades. Poor excuse, I know. Do I pass? Did I do enough to be able to bitch about families who abandon children/siblings because they were gay, because they were sick? What about the clergy who refused to have anything to do people who died from AIDS? This was a bad idea. I’ll just shut up now. ---
**Author:** ![Baker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/bb73d2/32.png) [@Baker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Baker)\ **Post date:** [July 16, 2017, 7:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ruth-coker-burks-the-cemetery-angel/791386/6 "2017-07-16T19:29:56Z")
No, Foggy, it wasn’t a bad idea, it was a wonderful idea. Don’t let one poster get you down. Bless you too, really! ---
**Author:** ![Machine\_Elf](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/82dd89/32.png) [@Machine\_Elf](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Machine_Elf)\ **Post date:** [July 16, 2017, 9:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ruth-coker-burks-the-cemetery-angel/791386/7 "2017-07-16T21:47:49Z")
> [@Foggy](#): > > This is where I’m supposed to say something like “Faith in Humanity Restored!”, but being me, I can’t help feeling angry that Ruth had to do so much because others, who should have, refused to do anything. This. It’s a bit like hearing the stories of Oscar Schindler or Harriet Tubman; unlike rescuing someone from a “shit happens” plane crash or something, the actions of these people were required because other people - a great many other people, it seems- were cruel monsters. ---
**Author:** ![Helena330](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/helena330/32/531_2.png) [@Helena330](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Helena330)\ **Post date:** [July 16, 2017, 10:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ruth-coker-burks-the-cemetery-angel/791386/8 "2017-07-16T22:10:55Z")
> [@Lucas\_Jackson](#): > > Bolding mine. > I applaud Ruth and her efforts but I gotta ask, what are you doing for people with AIDS? From looking at your other posts, you just like antagonizing people. **Foggy** , it’s a good thread that asks some tough questions. Don’t go away. ---
**Author:** ![not\_what\_you\_d\_expect](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/not_what_you_d_expect/32/3246_2.png) [@not\_what\_you\_d\_expect](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/not_what_you_d_expect)\ **Post date:** [July 17, 2017, 1:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ruth-coker-burks-the-cemetery-angel/791386/9 "2017-07-17T01:00:17Z")
Foggy, it’s good to see you on here. You’d been on my mind. Thanks for starting the thread. I’d never heard of Ruth Coker Burks. I’m pleased to have learned about her today. ---
**Author:** ![Lucas\_Jackson](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lucas_jackson/32/303_2.png) [@Lucas\_Jackson](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lucas_Jackson)\ **Post date:** [July 18, 2017, 12:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ruth-coker-burks-the-cemetery-angel/791386/10 "2017-07-18T00:22:57Z")
> [@Helena330](#): > > From looking at your other posts, you just like antagonizing people. > > **Foggy** , it’s a good thread that asks some tough questions. Don’t go away. Oh, boo hoo. You know what would have been a good, even great, OP? “Ruth Coker was a great person. My faith in humanity is restored! \*” Instead he then condemed the rest of the world \*for not doing what he thought they should have. 15 years ago I lost a close friend to suicide. Since then I have been manning crisis help lines weekly. I also give a lot of time, money and effort to a grass roots organization to stop climate change. There is nothing inherently special about helping AIDS victims to the exclusion of other charities. Good for the OP that he has put in his time. It’s a worthy endeavor. I heartily applaud his sacrifice. But there are literally hundreds of thousands of worthy causes that need good souls help with. Sorry my humanitarian efforts don’t meet the OP’s expectations. ---
**Author:** ![Nava](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/da6949/32.png) [@Nava](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nava)\ **Post date:** [July 18, 2017, 5:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ruth-coker-burks-the-cemetery-angel/791386/11 "2017-07-18T05:11:37Z")
Suicide isn’t contagious. Thankfully, neither is stupidity, because if you’re thin-skinned enough to think that “why was so many people whose JOBS was to help people with AIDS not doing it?” was a personal attack on you, you’re as self-centered as a black hole. Unless you happen to be one of those medics or cementery workers who refused to even touch someone who had AIDS or who had died of it, of course. If you are, whine away. ---
**Author:** ![BigT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bigt/32/12044_2.png) [@BigT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BigT)\ **Post date:** [July 18, 2017, 5:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ruth-coker-burks-the-cemetery-angel/791386/12 "2017-07-18T05:33:35Z")
> [@Lucas\_Jackson](#): > > Oh, boo hoo. You know what would have been a good, even great, OP? “Ruth Coker was a great person. My faith in humanity is restored! \*” Instead he then condemed the rest of the world \*for not doing what he thought they should have. Well then, there’s your problem. He never at any point said that everyone should have helped. He simply said that those who should have helped didn’t. And, if you actually know anything about the AIDS situation in the time period in question, what he said is not remotely untrue. This is a woman who had to voluntarily take care of these people only because the institutions that normally handle medical crises refused to touch it. It was a punishment from God for those horrible gays. There’s nothing at all wrong with him being upset that the institutions failed. In fact, it’s good that he’s not glossing over that and being all rosy about it. What this woman did was great, but we can’t lose sight of the fact that she shouldn’t have had to do it. ---
**Author:** ![BigT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bigt/32/12044_2.png) [@BigT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BigT)\ **Post date:** [July 18, 2017, 5:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ruth-coker-burks-the-cemetery-angel/791386/13 "2017-07-18T05:34:57Z")
nvm. Not sure how to ask without getting in trouble myself. ---
**Author:** ![Drunky\_Smurf](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/drunky_smurf/32/449_2.png) [@Drunky\_Smurf](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Drunky_Smurf)\ **Post date:** [July 18, 2017, 6:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ruth-coker-burks-the-cemetery-angel/791386/14 "2017-07-18T18:12:59Z")
> [@Lucas\_Jackson](#): > > I applaud Ruth and her efforts but I gotta ask, what are you doing for people with AIDS? I changed my Facebook profile pic. I’ve done my part in saving the world. ---
**Author:** ![Ellecram](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ellecram/32/18948_2.png) [@Ellecram](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ellecram)\ **Post date:** [July 19, 2017, 1:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ruth-coker-burks-the-cemetery-angel/791386/15 "2017-07-19T01:58:21Z")
Reading about this woman brought back so many memories from that heartbreaking era. My brother was one of the ones who lost so many friends during those years before coming down with the virus himself somewhere around 1990. My father never abandoned him and took him back in when he could no longer manage on his own. I did what I could to hold him together but, unfortunately, his story ended with suicide 9 years ago.