Betty Lewis Frewing’s 100 years of life have taken her around the globe in ventures helping the less fortunate.
She was born in Salem, Ore., and for the past 25 years she has lived at Willamette View Manor in Milwaukie, Ore.
Betty was born April 19, 1910 and moved with her family to Portland as a youngster. After graduating from Willamette University in 1931, Betty taught English in Shanghai, China, for one year. She returned from China and took a teaching position in Redmond, Ore.
She met her future husband, H. Leslie Frewing, at Willamette University, from which they both graduated in 1931. They were married on June 5, 1935, in Baltimore, where he was a medical student at Johns Hopkins University Medical School. From 1937 until 1960, Betty and Les made their home in Vancouver, where he was a co-founder of The Vancouver Clinic.
She was active in First Presbyterian Church, the American Association of University Women and various school activities. Because all her boys were involved in Boy Scouts, Betty actively helped in the Scouting programs. She also had a very strong interest in international relations and promoted interest in student exchange programs.
After closing his Vancouver medical practice in 1960, the couple would fulfill their dream of working and serving in other areas of the world. Les accepted a position with a medical team called MEDICO in Kuala Lipis, Malaysia. Betty joined her husband, where she taught school and managed a team of eight people providing health care until 1962.
Following their experience in Malaysia, Betty and Les moved to Mangla, West Pakistan, until 1968. In Pakistan she again taught school. The couple moved to Nairobi, Kenya, where she taught in a refugee camp and Les was a surgeon with the African American Medical Foundation as one of the “Flying Doctors of East Africa.”
More teaching and doctoring awaited them on the island of Kwajalein, in the Marshall Islands of the South Pacific and in Rhodesia (now Zimbabwe).
After retiring to Bend, Ore., in 1972, they were soon accepting a series of annual short-term volunteer assignments throughout Africa, South America and the American Southwest. When they weren’t volunteering, they were traveling, visiting China and Russia and pulling their travel trailer to Alaska at least five times.
Betty and Les moved to Willamette View Manor in 1985. Les died in 1993.
Throughout their lives, Les and Betty supported Willamette University. They funded a scholarship for international students and were honored by being jointly selected Distinguished Alumni of the Year in 1963.
Along with her three sons, John of Tigard, Ore., Bob of Olympia and Kent in LaCanada, Calif., Betty has seven grandchildren and 11 great-grandchildren.
Her family says Betty’s enduring interest in helping less fortunate people around the world through teaching, and her constant interest and personal encouragement, has been the driving force in her life.
Family members will gather Saturday at Willamette View Manor to celebrate Betty’s 100th birthday.
