"You come back and visit any time you want to. You're always welcome here." This was a heart speaking, one belonging to Mary Elizabeth Newsome, nee Dandridge. It was a gracious, rural Southern-bred heart of exceptional radiance.

Known as Betty to family and friends, who are a very numerous group in California and beyond, Mary Elizabeth Newsome passed away in Lompoc on April 10 ^th from a series of infirmities that finally overtook her: She had been both a loving and a well-loved presence in this world for nearly a century.

Betty was born on the 10 ^th of November, 1919 in Center Cross, Virginia, a hamlet about fifty miles north by northeast from Richmond, on the western banks of the Rappahannock, a few miles north of that river's juncture with the Chesapeake Bay. It was a time and place where "social media" was comprised of people passing by, amiably talking with neighbors who sat out on wooden porches, and where "going for a ride" likely involved a horse or a mule.

Betty, in concert with her beloved husband, Louis Otto Newsome, was a central figure in Lompoc's nascent African-American community from the 1960s and forward. She loved the city deeply despite having suffered shunning maltreatment in her first years of living there.

She met her husband-to-be in New York and they became married on October 4 ^th , 1942. Photos during their courtship show a vivacious and genteel young woman seated near a young man desperate to impress her. Indeed, he impressed everyone who ever knew him. Lou and Betty Newsome left New York City for Lompoc in 1960. He spent most of his career here as an electrical engineer in the Western Ops Division of ITT Federal Services Corporation at Vandenberg Air Force Base. The couple was a cohesive force for the African-American community in Lompoc. Their apartment, and the generous dinners often served there, provided a welcome touch of home for military personnel of color stationed locally.

Lou passed away on January 5 ^th , 2012, in Lompoc. At his bedside Betty spoke plainly, levelly, and yet to bystanders heartbreakingly, "I'll be with you soon."

Betty often recalled that she had ultimately been won over by the kindness of Lou's heart. Their daughter Carol was born after they had been married 15 years, happily astonishing a couple who had thought their marriage was to remain childless.

Carol Newsome, who provided selfless care to Betty across recent years and kept their home open to visitors who loved paying tribute to the woman simply called "Mom" by so many of them, is among her survivors. She is also survived by two younger sisters – Jean Noel of Laneview, Virginia, near Center Cross, and Everdiene Lumpkin of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.