Charles Ray

Charles Ray was called by The Creator on Saturday, July 29, 2023 at Baptist Hospital in Little Rock.
Charles was enrolled in The Warrior Society and Tribal Council of the Ouachita Band of Cherokee Nation West. He proudly possessed the Tribal name of "Little Oak". He was poet, novelist, college professor, high school English teacher, soldier, lumberjack, and amateur naturalist. Charles tried to live a simple life in a complex, artificial world. In search of the simple ways, he spent much time in the wild places of Alaska, Canada, Kenya, and Tanzania before settling in the Ouachita Mountain west of Spring Lake near Belleville, Arkansas, where he lived happily and raised fine black and tan tree hounds. His ashes will be scattered and mixed with Hunter, Boone, Warrior, Tree, and Babe, six of the hounds who furnished him great hunting pleasure and faithful friendships. His land is willed to the Arkansas Heritage Association and will become a Wilderness area.
Charles Ray was born in Brevard, North Carolina, near the Reservation of the Eastern Band of Cherokees and Smokey Mountain National Park. His parents were William Burgin Ray and Mamie McCrary Ray. His Cherokee blood stems from his father and he was blood related from his mother to member of the Western Band of Cherokees. Brothers and sister were Foster, Blanche Huggins and Beatrice Baynard Wellington. He has many beloved friends, nieces, nephews and cousins in North Carolina, South Caroline, Florida, Arkansas, Missouri, Oklahoma, and California.
A veteran of three years with the United State Army where he received the Experts Badge for Rifle shooting and was a member of the battalion rifle team the competed in the Seventh Army Championship, he served twenty-eight months in Europe. In 1986 he received the Silver Poets Award from the World of Poetry. Charles completed in 1974 his doctoral dissertation entitled An Interdisciplinary Study Based on Four Selected Novels by A.B. Guthrie Jr. Five Volumes of his poetry and fiction were published and entitled Arrowhead Pieces Lance: A Child Garden of Evil, The Tarheel Connection: An Environmental romance, Peace River Anthology, and Arrowheads and Darkeyes.
Charles Ray graduated from Brevard High School, Brevard College, Western Carolina University, and Appalachian State University. He received the Doctor of Arts degree in English from Middle Tennessee State University. He was a member of Signa Tau Delta (the National English Honor Society) and Pi Gamma Mee (the International Social Science Honor Society).
The Arkansas Fish and Game commission awarded Charles Ray the Triple Trophy Award for the tree deer he killed in 2021-2022 one by his bow, one by his muzzle and on by his modern rifle.
Charles often thanked The Creator for his rich life and saw The Spirit more clearly in natural things rather than in books and buildings. A scholarship in Creative Writing has been created in his name at MTSU.
Arrangements by Cornwell funeral Home Danville and River Valley Crematory Dardanelle.