Elizabeth “Betsy” Grace Brown

Elizabeth “Betsy” Grace Brown, born October 3, 1956 to Margaret Boyle and Joseph M. Brown in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. She died May 21, 2015 in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma.

Memorial Service and Celebration of Life will be held on Saturday, June 13^th at 2:00 p.m. at First Unitarian Church on N.W. 13^th street in downtown Oklahoma City, Oklahoma.

Betsy was preceded in death by her parents and sister, Christine. Betsy is survived by her partner, Kathy McCallie and three beloved cats.

Betsy grew up in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania and thrived in girl scouting and later as a counselor and leader. She earned a BA in philosophy from the University of Idaho, where she worked summers as one of the few women on a hot shot forest fire fighting crew. She was awarded a Master of Library and Information Studies from the University of Oklahoma and was unanimously nominated by the SLIS faculty for election to Beta Phi Mu, the International Library and Information Studies Honor Society. She also enjoyed earning a certificate in Women and Gender Studies from the University of Oklahoma.

Betsy lived for fifteen years in Eugene, Oregon working as a writer and editor for Women’s Press, a feminist collective newspaper. She was a board member of the Only Women’s Land – OWL farm. In Eugene she started “Betsy’s Computer Ranch” taking parts of discarded computers and building and programming computers to give to women who couldn’t afford them. Teaching computer literacy and providing access to information was a passion that continued to lead her to later work in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma as a computer educator for the Oklahoma Metropolitan Library System.   Over her life her day jobs included work as a janitor and various retail positions such as Fed Ex/Kinkos where she dreamed of starting a labor union. She was a committed blogger and writer, proud 8 time winner of National Novel Writing Month, and an accomplished poet. She relished her work and her colleagues at Bizzell Library at the University of Oklahoma. Betsy was an active participant and supporter of Herland Sister Resources and Dumbledore’s Army.

Memorial contributions can be made to Herland Sister Resources or VOICE, Voices Organized in Civic Engagement, OKC.