Our mom, Betty Joyce (Deffenbaugh) Davis Kester, passed away the morning of July 18, 2025. She was at home, right where she always wanted to be, next to her big bay window with the sunshine on her face. She was taken off of dialysis last week because her heart was too weak to handle it anymore at the spry age of 95.
Betty was born January 1, 1930, in Hot Springs, Fall River, South Dakota. She was the third child of Wilber Harland Deffenbaugh and Agnes Mable Brodrick. When she was a week old her family of five moved in a 1909 Ford Model T to Broadus, Montana. There was a horrible blizzard, and the car had no glass windows, but had blankets tacked over the window spaces. It was quite the ordeal when they broke down and the journey became even more perilous!
Betty grew up in Broadus on the plains and wheat fields of Eastern Montana where she loved riding her horse, Champ, and playing with her dog, Tippie. Her father Wilber built and owned a garage and Standard Oil gas station. Her family had a two bedroom home adjoining the back of the garage and they had to share their bathroom with the customers of the gas station. However, they felt blessed because they had the county’s only working toilet while everyone else had outhouses.
Betty would go with her father to Deadwood, South Dakota, and play in the town and run around the Mt. Moriah Cemetery that housed the graves of Wild Bill Hickok and Calamity Jane, to name a few.
She roamed the sacred hills of the Big Horn Battlefield where General Custer had his last stand and so many men perished. Betty and her father would walk the fields and find arrowheads long before it became a national park. Betty learned to love history, places, people, and nature because her parents took her to interesting places.
When Betty was a junior in high school her father took a hunting trip to the Bitterroot Valley and fell in love with Hamilton. Betty left her school and friends kicking and unhappy about the move to Hamilton where her father built Deffy’s Motel and a gas station and garage. After making new friends and becoming a cheerleader for HHS, she then loved Hamilton so much that she spent the rest of her life there. Her final wish was to return to her home to spend her last few days.
After the Second World War was over, Betty married a returning Marine, Earl Joseph Davis, in 1948 and they had two daughters, Katherine Gayle and Cynthia Joyce. Betty and Earl got divorced in 1969 and Betty married Herbert Hadley Kester. Betty then adopted three grandchildren, Velvet, Michael, and Rheann, and raised them as her own.
Betty loved working several jobs, including being a telephone operator before phones went to dial and secretary to several doctors at the Rocky Mountain Laboratory. She always excelled in whatever she was working for at the time.
Betty loved to read, and one of her hardest trials was losing her sight. She wanted to read and see her friends and family and her beautiful mountains.
Betty and her father were baptized in the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints on October 31, 1953. She served as a Primary President and taught many children’s classes.
Betty was lovingly cared for by Rheann and Velvet for her last few days and they were with her until the very end, giving her tender support and whispered love.
Betty was grandmother to nine, and great grandmother to thirteen.
Preceding Betty in death was her daughter Cynthia (28 December 1998), grandsons Robert Hart (12 June 2008); Stephen Hart (27 August 2023); Michael Kester (25 December 2024); and great granddaughter Amber Perry (2 December 2002).
Funeral services for Betty were July 28, 2025 at the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in Hamilton, Montana. Interment was at Riverview Cemetery in Hamilton.
Condolences may be left for the family at www.dalyleachchapel.com