Betty R. Smith

Services for Betty Smith, 86, of Gainesville, will be held Saturday, December 27 at 2PM at the George J. Carroll and Son Funeral Home Chapel. Burial will follow in Fairview Cemetary under the direction of the same. Public viewing will be held from 2-4PM Friday, December 26 at George J. Carroll and Sons.

Betty Smith died December 22, 2008, at the Ganiesville Health and Rehabilitation Center. She had successfully survived since 1979 battling breast cancer for the past 30 years, and this has served as an inspiration to countless many. Her faith sustained her. She and her husband, Reverend Charles Edward Smith, who she married on August 17,1945, had been a part of the Lake Texoma United Ministry for 35 years. He preached and she played the organ, piano or keyboard for the residents and visitors of the Lake Texoma Area, particularly the Paw Paw and Rock Creek Resorts, the Cedar Mills Marina, and the Sheppard Air Force Base Recreation Annex. Reverend Smith Road at Lake Texoma was named in the honor of their long ministry.

Her husband Charlie joined the United States Army Air Corps on September 27,1941 and served in the North African and European Theaters of War. She was very patriotic and proud of being the wife of a WWII verteran. After the war he went on to serve until 1961 in the United States Air Force. She loved being an Air Force wife and homemaker in Kansas, Massachusetts, Florida, and Oklahoma. From 1961 to 1965 she was a Secretary in the Department of Architecture at the University of Oklahoma in Norman. In 1966, once again, along with Charlie she joined the faculty of Cooke County College where for 10 years they both ran the Vacational Councilling and Veterans Services programs, he as the director she as the assistant. She earned an Associates Degree at CCC. She joined the First Presbyterian Church of Gainesville in 1965. She taught Sunday School early on, and for the past eight years, she visited the ill and shut-in friends, in spite of being disabled herself. She was a unique individual who tried to help others all life long.

She will be sorely missed by all who have had the privilege to know her.

She was survived by her daughter, Dr. Betsy Lawrence of Cabin John, MD, sons Charles Lee Smith of Satellite Beach, Fl and Russell Albert Smith of Austin TX; Grandchildren Haley and Amelia Lawrence, Chauma and Kenneth Smith, Russell and Scott Smith and Lori Massey, plus adopted grandchildren Tayabba, Farzana and Nahidra Ravjani; and seven great-grandchildren.

She was proceded in death by her brother, Albert Lawrence Haley.

The family requests, instead of flowers, please send donations for a breast cancer cure to Susan G. Komen for the cure, P.O. Box 650309, Dallas, TX 75265-0309 in Betty's memory.