Betty Teeter Sloan

JONESBORO -- Betty Teeter Sloan packed multiple careers into one extraordinary lifetime. Mother of six. Influential community leader. Hall of Fame farm manager. Nana.
Mrs. Sloan, 91, died Tuesday, November 4, 2014, at her Jonesboro home surrounded by family and caregivers.
She was often called Jonesboro's unofficial Goodwill Ambassador and delighted in introducing the city to others, whether through the Governor's Conference on Tourism, which she first encouraged Jonesboro to host, or the Jonesboro Council of International Visitors, which she helped found.
Mrs. Sloan's efforts to promote her adopted hometown resulted in the Jonesboro Regional Chamber of Commerce naming its promotion award for her in 1991 when December 11 was proclaimed Betty T. Sloan Day by the mayor.
Long before Jonesboro became the regional entertainment center it has become, she convinced the chamber to sponsor a calendar of events monthly publication modeled after one she had picked up in another city. She gathered event information, sold ads, and helped distribute it to restaurants and other locations.
She promoted Jonesboro in countless other ways, always hoping to help it become a better place to live.
Betty Carroll Teeter married Jonesboro native James Eugene Sloan in 1946 and moved here in 1948 after he finished law school. Yet, if asked where she was from, she would likely respond, "Prescott," her beloved hometown in southwest Arkansas. She was born there on July 30, 1923, the only daughter of educators John Wesley Teeter and Ruth McCarroll Teeter. Both of her brothers, John Jr. and Bill, died in recent years.
She used her middle initial because Jonesboro already had another Betty Sloan -- her husband's aunt, Mrs. Ralph Sloan, who became one of her role models.
Betty T. Sloan was a 1945 graduate of the University of Arkansas at Fayetteville, where she met her future husband and made lifelong friends in the Pi Beta Phi sorority. With her home economics degree, she taught briefly at Prescott High School and, after raising six children, at Jonesboro High School. She also worked for the Nashville, Tennessee, Dairy Council while Jim attended Vanderbilt Law School. She used her home ec skills throughout her life -- cooking made-from-scratch meals, sewing for her children, crafting personalized gifts, and making a beautiful home.
When Jim died in 1979, she filled his seat at the 1980 Arkansas Constitutional Convention and went on to fill the void he left in farm management and community service.
At an age when others might have enjoyed a leisurely retirement, she helped manage E. Sloan Farms, the family corporation established by her father-in-law. As with most everything, she excelled and, in 2007, was named to the Arkansas Agriculture Hall of Fame, in part for being an advocate for agriculture in the wider business community.
She was a hands-on farm manager, marking weed patches with survey flags, and otherwise demonstrating her late husband's advice that the footprint of the landowner is the best fertilizer.
She was never prouder than when one of "her" farmers was recognized as Farm Family of the Year.
Even as president of E. Sloan Farms, when she was deeply involved in contracts, land leveling, drainage, irrigation and federal farm programs, she also listed her occupation as community volunteer. Among her priorities were United Way and Foundation of the Arts. But, reflecting the breadth and depth of her interests, she also received awards from groups as diverse as the Arkansas Archeological Society, Crowley's Ridge Girl Scout Council, the Arkansas State University College of Agriculture, the Craighead County Bar Association, the Arkansas Arts Council, Arkansas Acres for Wildlife, the Craighead County-Jonesboro Public Library, the Jonesboro Christmas Parade, and the area vo-tech high school. She served on many of their boards and committees.
She was quick to share credit, "I have had more than my share of honors and much of the work has been done by committees working with me or good friends who pitch in and help," she said when nominated for one statewide honor.
In 2009, she received a Lifetime Achievement Award from Northeast Arkansas Business Today.
In 1996 and again in 1997, Arkansas Business named her to its list of "Top 100 Women in Arkansas." A written profile paid tribute to her tenacity. "Set realistic goals, then don't give up," she told the publication, "I do not give up easily."
Her tenacity extended to her final health challenges. She did not give up easily.
She was on the original commission that transformed the 1926 Strand Theater building into The Forum civic auditorium in the late 1970s and continued to be a key supporter of the Foundation of Arts, which was eventually headquartered there. She maintained her involvement in historic preservation as recently as the salvation of the V.C. Kays House at ASU.
She lived by a saying learned in grade school that she remembered throughout her life: "Count that day lost, whose low descending sun, views from thy hand, no worthy action done."
Still, she found time for social activities such as Tally, The Book Club, the Twentieth Century Club, PEO chapter AJ, "Friday Night Girls," and two birthday clubs. Some of these friends she met on her first visit to Jonesboro almost 70 years ago.
She continued to read two daily newspapers and her hometown weekly, clipped articles to mail to extended family usually with several yellow Post-It messages attached, subscribed to local, state and national magazines, and kept up with the wider world with CNN as her go-to TV channel.
A proud "Yellow-Dog Democrat," she was known for the yellow-painted concrete dog and multiple political endorsements in her front yard at election time.
She enjoyed traveling with family and friends. With Jim and the children in "The Bus," a Dodge motor home retrofitted to sleep eight, she traveled throughout the U.S. and Canada. Later, she traveled overseas to Asia and Europe, rode an elephant, and slept in a Scottish castle. Until the end she was still looking wistfully at cruise brochures talking about a trip along the Mississippi River or New England coast.
She never lost the twinkle in her eyes and delight in her voice when she met new people or saw old friends.
She had initiative, determination, dedication, curiosity, and compassion. Once committed to a cause, she never wavered. Once she met a stranger, she learned their life story within minutes. She was smart and beautiful, feisty and stubborn. She liked style and substance. She was, in the simple words of a favorite family saying, the "best ever."
Mrs. Sloan is survived by six children, seven grandchildren, and two great-granddaughters -- John and Lee Ann Sloan and their son Matthew Sloan, all of Jonesboro; Jim and Rosemary Sloan, his daughter Breeyan Sloan, and his granddaughters Makayla Fraley and Madison Fraley, all of Estes Park, Colorado, and his son Jake Sloan of Denver; Kitty Sloan and her husband Bob Bernhard of Paragould; Cyndy Sloan Shepherd and her husband Roy Shepherd of Jonesboro, her daughter Caroline Bednar of Little Rock, and her son David Bednar Jr. of San Diego; Charlie and Becca Sloan and their daughters Shelby Sloan and Allie Sloan, all of Orlando, Florida; and Mary Sloan and "Little Doggie" of Santa Fe, New Mexico -- plus many nieces, nephews, cousins, friends, and hundreds of well-fed backyard birds.
The family wishes to thank her longtime caregivers especially Mary Golden, Diane Lard, Dianne Kee, and Loretta King plus more recent caregivers Ruth Ann Adams, Tina Samuels, Rebecca Like, and Christine Walker. Thanks also to her medical teams including nurse Debra Webb with Home Health Professionals, Dr. Mike Isaacson and nurse Joyce Files, Dr. Ladd Scriber, Dr. Matt Quick, Dr. Michael D. Hightower, Dr. Brannon Treece, and Dr. Thomas Mulligan.
Visitation will be Thursday from 4 p.m. to 6 p.m. at Emerson Funeral Home.
A memorial service will be Friday at 1 p.m. at First United Methodist Church with the Rev. John Miles officiating. Interment will be private at Holy Cross Cemetery.
As a lasting memorial, she would want everyone to work together to help make Jonesboro an even better place to live.
In lieu of flowers, the family suggests United Way of Northeast Arkansas, 407 Union St., Jonesboro, AR 72401, or a charity of the donor's choice.