Betty Jo Todd, 83, Dickinson, passed away Tuesday, August 26, 2014 at St. Alexius Medical Center, Bismarck. Betty Jo’s funeral service will be Saturday, August 30, 2014 at 11 a.m. at Dickinson United Methodist Church with Pastor Dick Rinearson officiating. Visitation will be Friday from 2 p.m. until 6:30 p.m. with a prayer service and time of sharing at 6:30 p.m. at Ladbury Funeral Service, Dickinson and will continue one hour prior to service time at the church. The family will be present to greet guests from 5 p.m. until 6:30 p.m. Inurnment will be at a later date at Riverside Cemetery, Hotchkiss, Colo.
Betty Jo Holmes was born December 25, 1930 in Durango, Colo., to Fred and Gladys (Williamson) Holmes. Betty Jo was raised and educated in Hotchkiss, Colo. After graduating from high school in Hotchkiss, Colo., in 1949, Betty Jo went on to attend Colorado State University in Ft. Collins, Colo. for one year, then one year of business college in Denver, Colo. She then worked two years for Shell Oil Company. Betty Jo married Robert Todd on June 7, 1953 at Hotchkiss and together they spent the next one and half years in Panama while Robert was in the US Army. After Robert’s discharge they returned to Colorado where they lived in Grand Junction and Boulder. They and their young family then moved to Dickinson where they lived for six years prior to moving to Norman, Okla., where Robert completed his doctorate and Betty Jo worked for the University of Oklahoma. Betty Jo and her family returned to Dickinson in 1970 and she began working for Kadrmas, Lee and Jackson in 1974 until her retirement in 1995.
Betty Jo was a member of Chapter B, PEO, the United Methodist Church Women, the church choir, Southwest Birders Assoc., and the Badlands Conservation Alliance. She was a past member of the St. Cecelia Music Society and had a lovely soprano voice. Betty Jo enjoyed traveling, including a mission trip to Haiti, bird watching, and reading but her greatest joy was time spent with her family and their families.
She is survived by her loving husband, Robert, Dickinson; four children, Fred (Stella), Longmont, Colo., Becky Olmstead, Spearfish, S.D., Bobbi Magnuson, Ft. Collins, Colo., and Levi (Dorthea), Golden, Colo.; eight grandchildren, Ben, Molly, Beth, Eric, Travis, Ivy, Elizabeth, and Lee; 17 great-grandchildren and one brother, Dick (Eiko) Holmes, Grand Junction, Colo.
She was preceded in death by her parents and one son-in-law, Garth Olmstead. In lieu of flowers the family request that a memorial be given in Betty Jo’s name to the DSU Foundation Todd Scholarship Fund or Dickinson United Methodist Church.
