Bettye Jean Peery

Bettye Jean Peery was born May 29, 1929, in Centerville, Tennessee, the second daughter of Adley Leftic and Lillian May Tarkington Peery. Her family moved to Short Branch in Hickman County to her grandparents' farm after her father died suddenly in 1935. There she enjoyed the love of a caring mother and a wonderful grandmother and living in the county where she, with her family, walked each Sunday to the Campground Presbyterian Church. She finished high school in Centerville in 1948 and went to Washington, D. C. where her sister, Lorraine, was already living. She worked for AAA for ten years before moving to Dallas to be with her sister, Lorraine, who had four small children and was having health problems. After working there for a few years, Bettye went to the Methodist Hospital of Dallas School of Nursing where she graduated in 1964 and was given the citizenship award. She later earned her BS in Nursing. She was living in Dallas in 1963 when President Kennedy was killed. Bettye moved to Nashville in 1978 to be near her mother and other family members. She began work at Vanderbilt Hospital in the Neonatal Department in 1978 and worked there for over thirty years, retiring in 2009, at age eighty. Most of her work there was at night, and she enjoyed taking care of the tiny babies. Bettye was baptized in the Campground Presbyterian Church on Swan Creek in 1944 after attending there for years, walking the two miles every Sunday with her family. Later in Nashville, she faithfully attended Christ Church and was baptized there in 2002. She was a doll collector and in 1983, she along with her sister, Sarah, started the Grand Ole Doll Club. She enjoyed years of meeting with her doll sisters, going to doll events and collecting baby dolls and her vintage Ginny dolls. Bettye lived an amazing life doing what she loved taking care of babies at Vanderbilt Hospital. She spent over forty years at the Methodist Hospital and Vanderbilt as an employee, but not a patient. In all those years, she was only in the hospital as an outpatient. In her later years she had dementia; however, she was able to stay in her home because of the caring and daily help she received from Keith and Kathy. She is survived by her sister, Sarah Armistead, Brentwood, Tn. Nieces and nephews, Keith (Kathy) Sawyer, Lebanon, Tn., Debbie Romero, Midlothian, Texas, Wendy Russell, Midlothian, Texas, Pamela (Paul) Chervemak, Alliance, Ohio, Gary (Becky) Barnhouse, Alliance, Ohio, five great nieces and two great nephews, many first cousins and her doll club members of whom were a very important part of her life. She was preceded in death by her parents, sisters, Ova Lee Sawyer, Marie Barnhouse and Lorraine Russell. McDonald Funeral Home is honored to be serving the Peery family.

Bettye Jean Peery

May 29, 1929 - August 21, 2024