When one of their own has had a setback or is in need of some help or assistance, the Atlantic Highlands residents have shown they’re well up to the task and eager to press onward.
So as a result, nonagenarian Betty Lou Connell is still secure in her home on Wesley avenue, the very house in which she was born. But she still faces the threat of losing it because of insufficient funds to keep up with with current inflationary costs and figures.
You might say Betty Lou has had a tough life all her adult years. She had finished St. Agnes grammar school, was popular and smart and a graduate of Red Bank Catholic High, then headed for a career in modeling.
That’s when she met Wiliam F.X Connell, a dashing, handsome young man who stole her heart. Not once but twice. And Betty Lou Matthews, daughter of John and Betty Matthews, became Mrs. William F.X. Connell.
Life was great for a few years, indeed wonderful enough so the couple had five children, three sons and two daughters within a seven year period.
But Bill had his own problems with addictions. There came the day when he kissed Betty Lou goodbye in the morning, indicated he’d be home from his teaching job at lunchtime as usual, then never showed.
Bill Connell up and abandoned Betty Lou and their five children, then ages 5 through 12.
But years later, they reunited, Betty Lou eager and willing to forgive Bill’s transgressions and the family started up again.
That, too, worked for a while, but Bill simply couldn’t measure up, given his own problems. He disappeared again.
Later in life, his grown daughters, Maureen Akerlund and Donna Soleau, who now lives in Florida, caught up with him and did have the chance to reunite and share their love of him before he died in a nursing home in Florida. His sons had caught up with him at another time when he was in California. A close knit family that understood hard times and difficult illnesses.
Betty Lou in the meantime, had raised those kids by herself and had worked a plethora of jobs to do it and support herself. There were the years she was Frank Outwater’s secretary at Mater Dei High School, the times she worked at Dick Stryker’s Bayshore Pharmacy, or for each of two beloved town doctors, Dr. DeRobbio and Dr. Commentucci. She was beloved by all the little ones at the Little House, Riverview Hospital’s Day Care Center where she was a care giver. There were the 1960s and 70s, difficult times for everyone.
Betty Lou’s mom died, Betty Lou moved back into the family home on Wesley Avenue to care for her dad, and dad and daughter frequented all the local flea markets supplementing the family income.
And the list goes on.
There were more tragedies in Bety Lou’s life, Her three sons, John, who was tragically electrocuted, Walter, and Billy, have all died within 15 years of each other.
But now time passes as does youth and energy, and now at 91, Betty Lou, still living in the same house, but with a reverse mortgage that requires regular payments, and those funds already run amok in current inflationary times, was about to lose it through foreclosure.
Until her daughters and friends stepped in, started a Fund Me page and managed to dodge the bullet for another month or so.
But it won’t be long before the next payment is due, then the one after that. So Betty Lou Connell, who has helped so many people over so any decades, Betty Lou who has been a laughing, friendly, outgoing personality that charms everyone she meets, could use a little more help from some friends.
If you are a friend of Betty Lou’s, or simply someone who wants to help a person in need, visit GofundMe.com, click on Betty Lou Connell, read her story, and help this Atlantic Highlands native remain in her own home.
