Mona Elizabeth (Betty) Brown Cates

Published 6:00 am Saturday, April 28, 2012

Mona Elizabeth (Betty) Brown Cates, 86, passed from this life on Thursday, April 26, 2012, at the Morgantown Care & Rehabilitation Center.

She is survived by her devoted husband of 64 years, Thomas Granville Cates; two children, Elizabeth Ann and Granvil Eugene Cates; in addition to five grandchildren and seven great-grandchildren. She was preceded in death by her parents, Rex and Erdine Brown of Ohio and Butler counties, and by three brothers and four loving sisters, who are joyfully with her now.

She was born in Ohio County on Feb. 20, 1926, and graduated from Butler County High School before moving to Bowling Green for her first job as a telephone operator, where she met and married her husband, Granville, while he was attending Western Kentucky University after returning from World War II. Betty and Granville resided in his hometown of Russellville for many years, where they raised their children and were active in the Methodist Temple and the local Genealogical Society before moving to Butler County in 1991. She devoted her life to her family and never traveled far from her home, but she leaves beautiful memories for all of us in the form of stories of her life growing up on a farm and in the beautiful quilts that now keep us warm. Her artistic nature was expressed in the patterns and colors of the many quilts she made by hand throughout her life, an art she learned from her mother and shared with her sisters.

Funeral services will be at Smith Funeral Home in Morgantown at 10:30 a.m. Monday, with Bro. Darrin Jones officiating. Visitation will be from 2 p.m. to 9 p.m. Sunday and from 8 a.m. until service on Monday, all at Smith Funeral Home. Burial following the service will be in Monticello Church Cemetery at Provo, beside her parents, grandparents and two of her beloved siblings. We commend her into God’s keeping.