Annual Ray Curry

Most of us are not born into places and situations that eventually become who we are. She was a city lady seemingly trapped, for the first two decades of her life, in the toils and rigors of the "JIM CROW" south. But break free, she did.

Annual Ray Hampton Curry was born in Dekalb, Kemper County, Mississippi. She is the eighth child of eleven born to the late Lige Hampton and Louise Mosley Hampton.

She departed this life on December 18, 2023.

Her early childhood and teen years were spent  on a farm which was the general livelihood of a major portion of the Black American population in that era and area.

Born into a church going, bible believing family, she was raised with a reverent fear and respect for God. She followed in the footsteps of her older siblings and joined Brown Ridge Missionary Baptist Church in her early years. Sundays were either a mule drawn wagon to Brown Ridge or a walk to Beulah Baptist Church, a mile from home. She and all her siblings were the beneficiaries throughout their lives of the Fervent and Ernest prayers of Christlike parents.

Ray, as she was affectionately known, began her educational journey at Hampton Quarters (Rosenbaum Mill) School, a one room school house built for black students. Classes were separated only by different parts of the same room. The school closed down in the mid 1940s and students were transferred and bussed to Whisenton High School where she played team basketball and graduated in the spring of 1954.

Growing up with male siblings as her contemporaries contributed to her athleticism and ability to take on burdensome farm chores usually not assigned to girls.

Ray never accepted farming as a future and in the mid 1950s, after she and her brother Bill completed a crop started by their father, Lige, whose health failed, she joined the ranks of many others and migrated north to Cleveland, Ohio in search of a different life.

She lived in Cleveland until she married Hugh Grant (Jabo) Curry and moved to Flint, Michigan.

Her brother, Bill, came to live with her briefly before moving on to Cleveland, Ohio, himself.

Ray leaves to bask in beautiful memories, six children: Lige Grant Curry, Erick D. Curry Sr. (Joanette), Sherri Curry, Anthony Curry, Raymont Curry (Venus), and Shad Curry (Joann); grandchildren Erick Curry Jr, Jasmyne  Curry, Marti Frieson, Marcus Frieson, Jabrii Curry, Keon Roberson, Shadaya Curry, Shania Curry, Shad Curry Jr, and Victoria Harris; great grandchildren Kyrie Jones, Dominic Jones, Jayden Stevenson, Kylie Roberson, Zinise Roberson, and Aria Frieson; one brother Artis W. Hampton (Margie); and many nieces, nephews, extended family and friends.

She was preceded in death by her parents, Lige & Louise Hampton and ten siblings, Armuria Hampton Grady, Annie Jean Hampton, Henry Thomas-Hampton, Guyora Hampton Bonds, Ivra D. Hampton, Opal Dane Hampton Dennis, Captoria Hampton, Roydon Hampton, Willie M. Hampton, and Johnnie Ruth Hampton King.

Family and friends are welcome on Wednesday, December 27, 2023, from 11 a.m. until time of Homegoing Service at 12 p.m., at Slone & Co. Life Celebration Center 3556 W. 130th St. Cleveland, OH 44111. Interment West Park Cemetery.