- Date Of Birth: October 10, 1933
- Date Of Death: March 7, 2014
- State: Colorado
Betty Anne Lacs was born in Baltimore Maryland on October 10, 1933. Betty died at home in Highlands Ranch, Colorado on March 7, 2014.
Betty was raised in the Lithuanian community of Baltimore, Maryland. She lived with her parents and grandmother where she argued fiercely in Lithuanian with her Grandmother. Betty was educated in Catholic schools for sixteen years. She started school at St Gerome (Baltimore) and continued High School at the Institute of Norte Dame (Baltimore). Betty earned a Bachelors Degree in Mathematics at Notre Dame College (Baltimore) at a time when women rarely pursued careers in sciences. A lover of sports as well as academia, Betty played basketball in high school and was on the Varsity basketball team in college. Betty’s love of sports continued throughout her life and she was a fan of the University of Colorado Women’s Basketball team. She loved to support other young women balancing the demands of sports and education.
Upon graduation, Betty was offered a scholarship to do graduate level work at Catholic University in Washington DC. Instead Betty decided to go to work at the Glenn L. Martin Company (currently merged into Lockheed Martin) to pay off college debts. Betty was hired as a Systems Engineer in 1955 and had various assignments. Her most satisfying challenge was coordinating all test reports for a new version of the Matador Cruise Missile being tested at White Sands. Kudos were received from the USAF for an accurate and on-time performance.
While at Martin, Betty met a young engineer named Glen Dickman. They were married on October 12, 1958. Betty and Glen’s first daughter, Alice, was born the following year. The family moved to Denver, Colorado shortly after Alice’s birth for Glen to begin work at a new Martin facility in Waterton, Colorado. Betty spent the next phase of her life raising three children, Alice, Patricia (born 1964) and Michael born 1966). In addition to running the household, Betty instilled a drive to succeed in education in her three children. Alice graduated from Colorado School of Nines in 3 ½ years, earning a BS Chemical Petroleum Engineering. Patricia earned a BS Architecture from the University of Kansas and a MS Architecture from Cranbrook Academy of Art (Bloomfield Hills, MI). Michael earned BS and MS degrees in Electrical Engineering and Computer Science at the University of Colorado.
While raising the kids, Betty also began her computer programming education at the local community college. In the late seventies, Betty returned to the workforce to work for Diner’s Club as a credit systems analyst. Always interested in numbers and logic systems, Betty became an integral part of installing and proving a behavior scoring system to Diners’ Club’s operating procedure. Modifications of this early behavioral science are still used to monitor our credit safety today.
Retirement for Betty included new adventures. She co-founded VIM (Vigor in Maturity) with a close friend and colleague. The mission of VIM was to deliver doctor approved exercises to people of 50+ years of age. She continued her passion for education by volunteering at the local elementary school to help teach and inspire students to love math.
Throughout her life, Betty was social and fun-loving. She especially enjoyed playing cards with friends and games with her family. At 60, Betty became a world traveler and has traveled through Europe and Asia, usually with Elder Hostel groups where she continued her life-long love of learning through her later years.
In 2004, Betty survived a mild heart attack and triple bypass surgery. Betty was granted ten more years to spend with friends and family. After her final cardiac arrest, Betty passed away at home on March 7, 2014.
Betty is survived by Glen, her husband of 55 years; her children Alice Anne Probst (husband Jon), Patricia Marie Dickman (husband Lewis W. Carlson) and Michael Paul Dickman and her grandchildren; Tyler James Probst and Christine Elizabeth Probst.
