BETTYE SNOW / KLAUSS / ROBERTS (1927-2013)
The E-Sylum (2/25/2024)
Book Content
BETTYE SNOW / KLAUSS / ROBERTS (1927-2013)
E-Sylum Feature Writer and American Numismatic Biographies author Pete Smith submitted this article on Bettye Klauss and her 'numismatic bug'. Thanks!-Editor
Some weeks I write about a numismatist who is famous or important. This week I will report onan obscure woman who caught the numismatic bug.
Bettye Juanita Snow was born on October 10, 1927, in Evansville, Indiana. Her parents wereWilliam Lampton Snow Jr. (1902-1966) and Amelia Winonah Lindlay (1906-1995). William wasmanager of the International Correspondence Schools in Evansville.
She graduated from Central High School and the Deaconess School of Nursing. She beganworking as a surgical nurse at Welborn Baptist Hospital. She received a Master's degree fromIndiana University in Bloomington.
On July 18, 1946, she was married to John Randolph Klauss (1926-2007) in Morganfield,Kentucky. They were the parents of John Randolph Klause, Jr. (1947-2006) and William Klauss(1952-2008). John remarried in 1958. His hobbies did not include numismatics.
An article in The Evansville Press for May 24, 1961, described her, She's a little bitty thing butevery ounce of her seems eminently endowed with bounce... This talented and intellectuallyanimated little creature is also an artist, college student, historian, numismatist, choir singer,photographer. mother, author and homemaker.
She was a teacher of nursing at Rockford Community College in Rockford, Illinois. She latermoved to Wausau, Wisconsin, where she met her second husband, Richard Roberts. They weremarried in 1973. He was the administrator of Northcentral Technical College in Wausau and diedin 1985.
She died on January 6, 2013, in Kaukauna, Wisconsin.
In 1960 she presented a program for more than a hundred members of the Evansville Coin Club.Her topic was Paper Money of the United States, 1861-1923
using an ANA slide set. Making apresentation from the slide set would not have required advance knowledge.
In 1961 she was secretary of the Evansville Coin Club. She was one of four club membershonored as Numismatists of the Year
for 1961. She served until 1964.
On October 26-27, 1963, she presented an exhibit on the numismatic bug. It took the award forBest-of-Show exhibit. A picture of her was shown in the Evansville Press for October 26, 1963.
The numismatic bug
was put on display at the Evansville Museum of Arts and Sciences.
The October 1963 issue of The Numismatist carried this story:
So much has been said and written about the bite of the numismatic bug that the EvansvilleCoin Club persuaded Secretary Bettye J. Klauss to study the source of this disease. After monthsof intensive study, research, travelling far and wide, and with the help of Dr. C. W. Robertson and Leslie Miley, Jr., of Evansville College, Mrs. Klauss has located and classified the
) and much more data about them will be the site offine exhibits ...bug.
Harmful only to man, there is no cure for its insidious and deadly sting. The disease transmittedby the insect is so contagious that it's been known to infect entire families. A pair of the bugs(the female is distinguished by a green-back
Her membership in the ANA was announced in the August 1964 issue of The Numismatist asmember R52835. This was the last time her name was mentioned in the magazine.
She was mentioned in Coin World twenty times during 1961-64. She was described as an artist.author, and Civil War scholar. Several of the articles mention the numismatic bug. After 1964,she returned to numismatic obscurity.
She was mentioned in the February 18, 2024, issue of The E-Sylum for her November 18, 1964,copyright of the numismatic bug.
I hope our mention here does not violate copyright rules.
Follow-up Question: Who was behind Tri-State Coin Supply Co., Inc. distributor of thenumismatic bug jewelry? They were out of business by 1968.
Thanks, Pete - great hobby history. And research often uncovers further research questions - can anyone tell us about Tri-State Coin Supply Co.?-Editor
To read the earlier E-Sylum article, see:
CATCHING THE NUMISMATIC BUG(https://www.coinbooks.org/v27/esylum_v27n07a12.html)
