Betty Lou Chaudoin

Betty Lou Palmer Chaudoin, 96, passed away peacefully Saturday evening, June 7, 2025, at Saint Francis Hospital in Muskogee, OK, after a week-long illness. A native of Muskogee, she was the daughter of Jack and Laura Bolen Palmer, and was born December 13, 1928. She grew up in Muskogee where she attended Longfellow, Washington, and Houston Elementary Schools, Alice Robertson Junior High, and graduated from Central High School in the Class of 1947. On January 11, 1947, Miss Betty Lou Palmer married Henry Hubbard Chaudoin in Ft. Smith, AR. Henry loved to tease Betty and tell people he met her when he was staying with his Aunt Ollie before entering the army in 1944, when she came down the block and invited him to a goat-ropin’ at her house on Saturday night. Betty was the mother of three daughters, Teresa, Denise, and Leslie, and caring for her husband, children, and home was her full-time job. She was a devoted daughter, helping her parents during their later years and through her mother’s final illness. She was a loving grandmother, great-grandmother, and great-great-grandmother to all her grandchildren. After her husband passed away in 1991, and with her children grown, Betty enjoyed going to line-dancing classes 3 or 4 times a week at the Senior Center and Hatbox with women who had been her life-long friends from their school days. For years, many of them would also get together every Monday night and Friday night at Joann Janway’s for dinner and dominoes. Betty also had the opportunity to travel with her oldest and dearest friend, Frances Huggins Lively, and some of Frances’ friends, to parts of the country where she had never been. She was a very health-conscious person, who was always active. From her youth into her 20s and 30s, she loved to bicycle with Frances and her dear friend Joann Janway. In their young adulthood, she loved playing tennis with Henry and Frances. She swore that what kept her healthy into old age, besides not smoking or drinking her whole life, was walking, line-dancing several times a week, doing circuit weight-training up into her late 80s at Curves in Muskogee until it closed, and then driving to the Curves in Wagoner until it closed. Days before her passing, she was still peddling an hour a day while she watched TV. Above all else, Betty loved the Lord and was a faithful follower of Jesus her entire life. She put her faith into practice in the life she lived. She remembered as a very young child loving to go to Sunday School. Her daughters all remember as small children, her reading to them from the Bible Story Book and listening to them as they said their prayers at bedtime. Sunday mornings were synonymous with Sunday School and Church. As a young mother, she started teaching the Pre-Schoolers’ Sunday School Class at Boulevard Christian Church in 1949, originally to keep Teresa from howling all through Sunday School, and did not “retire” from her position for over thirty years. She taught during Summer Vacation Bible School all those years, as well, and at York Street Christian Church, where she was a charter member. She started every day by praying and reading her devotional books and Bible. A child of the Great Depression, she was famous among the children and grandchildren for her frugality and having a coupon for everything. But she had an empathetic heart for people in need and was generous in her giving to the church, to good causes and those in need and less fortunate than she. For years she knitted blankets and sweaters for an organization that sent them overseas to children in need. And she had helped every one of her children and grandchildren at one time or another. Very weak and tired last week from a GI bleed, she told Denise that she was ready to go home-- not to her house but to heaven--she wanted to go home. We are so blessed to have had our Mama and Memaw for so many years, and we rejoice with her that she is now with the Lord and all the loved ones who have gone on before her. Betty was preceded in death by her husband, Henry; her parents, Jack and Laura Palmer; and her son-in-law, Jim Cole. She is survived by her daughters, Teresa Chaudoin, Denise Chaudoin, and Leslie Looper and her husband, John Reynolds; grandchildren, Carter McClendon (Kelly), Henry McClendon (Amber), Matt Moore (Jessie Culver), Nick Moore, and Mallory Martinez (Ulises), Lisa DeFoor (Bryan), Bret Looper, and Chase Looper; 12 great-grandchildren, and 1 great-great-grandson. At Betty’s request, there will be no viewing. A brief graveside service will be held at 10:00am, Friday, June 13th, at the Greenhill Cemetery Pavillion before she is buried beside her husband of 44 years. The service will be conducted by Rev. Jeff Cranton, Presbyterian Church of Muskogee.

Betty Lou Chaudoin

December 13, 1928 - June 7, 2025