Betty Torry

Betty Anderson Torry died February 16, 2021 at the Fountains Senior Living, Bettendorf, where she had resided since 2016. Visitation will be held from 9:30 - 11:00 a.m. on Saturday, September 11, 2021 at McGinnis-Chambers Funeral Home, Bettendorf.  Inurnment will be at Rosedale Cemetery, Cambridge, Illinois.

She was born December 31, 1929 in Chicago, Illinois to Gilbert and Eleanor (Bell) Fredrickson. She graduated from Cambridge Community High School and attended Western Illinois University. She married Arthur V. Anderson, Jr. in Cambridge, Illinois in 1947. They lived in Walnut, Illinois until moving to the Quad Cities in 1964. Art died in 1991. She married Richard D. Torry in 1992 He died in 2016. Betty resided in LeClaire from 1967 – 2016.

She was employed by the Catholic Diocese of Davenport for 24 years retiring in 1992. She was then employed by Sacred Heart Cathedral retiring in 1999. She received an honorary doctorate in Humanities from St. Ambrose University in 1988 for her work with immigrants and refugees while with the diocese. She initiated a Heart to Heart program for Amerasian and other refugee children and was instrumental in starting the Quad Cities Big Brother / Big Sisters program.

Mrs. Torry was an active participant and office holder in Methodist churches in Cambridge, Walnut, and Bettendorf and was an elder in the Princeton Presbyterian Church. She held offices in the Presbytery of East Iowa and the Synod of Lakes and Prairies. She was a member of the Independent Order of Vikings, Lodge #118 Moline, Illinois and Lodge #106 of Women of the Moose, Davenport. She was a past member of the Davenport Kiwanis. She was involved in music all her life and was a member of the Catfish Jazz Society.

She is survived by her daughter and son-in-law, Sharon and Jim Walker, Wayzata, Minnesota. She also leaves her stepson, Richard D. Torry II, Phoenix, Arizona; her stepdaughter and husband, Kathi and Jeff Burrows, Mesa, Arizona and their children. She is survived by grandson Shawn Anderson, Olathe, Kansas; granddaughter and husband,  Kelly and Jeremy Wells; 5 great-grandchildren; her sister and husband, Barbara and Richard Reimer, Tucson, Arizona; 2 nieces and many great nieces and nephews. She is also survived by her husband’s step-children; Steven Wing, Seattle, Washington, Dennis and Sarah Wing and Annette Beerbower, Davenport and step-grandchildren.

She was preceded in death by her parents, her husbands and her sons, Arthur V. Anderson III, and Richard D. Anderson.

Memorials may be made to the Princeton Presbyterian Church.