Betty Ibur

Ibur, Betty (nee: Harris), 92, of Clayton, MO, died on January 10, 2021. She was born on July 19, 1928, to Annette and Harry Harris, their only child. Betty was a mother, grandmother, great-grandmother, lifelong musician, city administrator, horseback rider, knitter, avid reader, ping-pong and bridge player, sports fan, and friend to many, many people.

Betty quickly developed a love for song and dance, very much inspired by Shirley Temple, born just a few months earlier. Beginning at age four, sporting the Shirley curls, started dance and piano lessons, performing in local theaters, churches, and synagogues. By the time she went to Wydown Middle School and Clayton High, Betty was performing professionally as an opera singer—a passion of her mother, Annette’s.

Though performing regularly, Betty threw herself into her academic courses, clubs, cheerleading, and the school theater. She regaled her kids with stories from her youth that included hanging out with her many pals, all of whom would remain lifelong friends, and writing stories for the school newspaper at The Dump, a popular café hangout at the corner of Wydown and Hanley. She was known as Tic to everyone, short for “Tickle,” because she suffered from what would later be affectionately called Inappropriate Laughter Syndrome. This rather unfortunate problem was passed down to all of her children and grandchildren, often manifesting itself at funerals, moments of silence at theaters, bar mitzvahs, baptisms, arguments… On more than a couple of occasions, Betty bragged (“I’m not bragging! I’m just stating the facts.”) about her dance card always being filled “and then some” prior to one of the countless dances she attended.

As high school and World War II were coming to a close and her opera career beginning to take off locally where Betty would eventually become a house vocalist for the St. Louis Symphony in the 1940s and 1950s, Tic had a chance encounter at the Shaw Park Pool in Clayton. Coming to the end of a lap lane, the very nearsighted Betty Harris grabbed for the wall but instead latched onto someone’s narrow, flat foot. Horrified, she popped up out of the water and said to the foot’s owner, “Those are the most gorgeous green eyes I’ve ever seen. Are you a movie star?”  Leslie Ibur (nee Isenburg) working as a shoe salesman at Famous Barr, was nine years her senior and immediately smitten. Leaving nothing to chance, he confirmed that he was indeed a movie star and world traveler, hence his amazing tan from traveling the South Seas—which was actually attained from other free pools he and his cousin could get into around town. Tic’s dance card days soon ended.

Betty and Les plotted out that she would complete her degree at Fontbonne College and marry immediately after. Each month into her freshman year, the couple kept upping the date by a year until they ended up married by the end of the second semester in 1946.  Les would go into the public insurance adjusting business with Betty’s dad, Harry, and ran it for another 50 years before selling to a national firm.

Betty and Leslie had three kids in quick succession—Bill, Janie, and John before having the next three spread out over the ensuing eleven years, Betsy, Jim, and Ted. Not long after Jim was born, Betty finally got the call she waited for since she was a young teenager. Now 31-years-old with five kids, she was asked to become a permanent performing member of the New York Metropolitan Opera. It would mean either her moving to NYC solo or uprooting the family. Les was not at all that keen about Betty leaving since moving the business, as far as he was concerned, was out of the question as was going by herself. Only a couple times in the relatively recent past did anyone ever hear Betty express any regrets wondering, “what if…” Instead, every Saturday afternoon, Live at the Met poured out of stereo speakers into Betty’s home.

In the 1970s, Betty changed direction. She started working as a volunteer at the Chronic Hospital, a city nursing home, which had also been known variously since 1871 as the St. Louis Poor House, New County Poor House, and the St. Louis County Insane Asylum. The conditions of the place were deplorable. In her early days at the hospital, the building was dimly lit, the walls streamed with green peeling paint, the sounds of moaning omnipresent, and patients were always scattered around in wheelchairs or wandering until a nurse or volunteer guided them back to wherever. The stench of urine and feces were baked into the building. Having placed her own grandmother in a less-than-adequate nursing home because she suffered from what would eventually become known as Alzheimer’s Disease, the very thing that would consume Betty more than 60 years later, she said this was the driving force for her volunteer work.

For years, Betty lobbied and badgered aldermen, mayors, as well as medical and business leaders to help institute changes to how the elderly were cared for in the city. Her work was transformative and helped instigate major changes to eldercare in St. Louis. Betty would go on to become President of the Board of Health and Hospitals for many years and was recognized as a Woman of Achievement in the 1980s.

A lifelong Republican like her husband, she threw her six liberal kids for a loop when she made a slow shift to the left and voted for John Anderson in 1980, Bill Clinton (twice), Barack Obama (twice), and Hillary Clinton.  Betty ended up being predictably unpredictable for someone who seemed so set in her ways. When it came to hot button social issues, she evolved over the years.

Betty and Les supported their children’s passions—music, sports, the arts, and more. They attended all of their games, theater performances, poetry readings, art openings, and concerts, even when their children became adults. Betty was incredibly proud of her grandchildren and great grandchildren of which there are many scattered around the country, including two granddaughters who became professional singer-songwriters very much inspired by their grandmother.

Betty never stopped singing, even as dementia consumed more and more of her, including the ability to remember lyrics. She left the world listening to Puccini’s opera, La Boheme, and as the character of Mimi, whom she played many times on stage, was singing her first aria “Mi Chiamano Mimi,” a fitting walk-off song for Betty Harris Ibur, the diva.




Memorials in Betty’s name may be made to Opera Theater of St. Louis.