Elizabeth Ann Bromwell

Elizabeth Ann McCracken Bromwell (Betty) died on April 30, 2021, in Baltimore, the city of her birth. She was born on December 20, 1930, to Willard McCracken and Marie Carrie Eser McCracken.

Betty lived a wonderfully full 90 years. She chose to attend Patterson Park High School across town, where she knew no one, and made lifelong friends. She earned a certificate as a medical secretary at the University of Baltimore, where she met her beloved husband James Orville Bromwell, Jr. (Jim). They married April 14, 1951, and remained happily married for the next 67 years until Jim’s death in May 2018. After their four daughters were born, Betty attended college at night to work on her degree. She got a job as a kindergarten teacher, finished her degree, taught at and directed various preschools, earned a master’s, and completed her career in education as the lower school director at Grace and St. Peter’s School in Baltimore, retiring in 1996. Along the way Betty readily welcomed the homeless pets their girls fell in love with. Betty and Jim took their daughters on delightful family vacation road trips. When the girls grew up and moved away, Betty and Jim traveled the country and the world to visit them and to have more travel adventures by themselves and with grandchildren. As Jim gradually became blind, Betty cared for him with love and tenacity. They sold the big family home in Baltimore and moved to Frederick, where they often walked downtown together, Betty the careful guide and Jim trusting her lead. At 89 Betty reluctantly gave up her independence and moved into the loving home of her daughter Mimi and family. Betty was an active member of Jerusalem Evangelical Church in Baltimore and considered that her church home. In recent years she attended Evangelical Lutheran in Frederick and Redeemer Lutheran in Damascus.

Betty is survived and mourned by the family she joyfully loved and honored: her daughters and their husbands Jan and Maurice (Maj, USA Ret) Saxton of Mount Airy, Maryland; Kate and Tom Manrodt of New Mexico; Mimi and Jim Knuth of Baltimore; and Lisa Bromwell and Sandy Kroopf of Los Angeles; and her grandchildren and great-grandchildren Will Saxton of Frederick; Eric (SGM, MDARNG) and Dr. Diana Saxton and their children Trent, Lucy, and Grant of Myersville, Maryland; Chris (LCDR, USN) and Krystle Saxton and their son Calvin of New Market, Maryland; Annie Manrodt of Nashville; Peter Manrodt of New Mexico; Caroline and Michael Rogers of Rockville; and Gregor Knuth of Baltimore.

As well as by her husband, Betty was predeceased by her parents, and by her much-loved older brother Robert in 1942.

A funeral service will be held at 9:30 am on Friday May 7, 2021, at Redeemer Lutheran Church, 27015 Ridge Road, Damascus. The family will receive friends from 8:30 am until the time of the service on Friday. Burial will be at 2:00 pm the same day at Loudon Park Cemetery, Baltimore. Arrangements are in the care of Myers-Durboraw Funeral Home in Westminster.

Memorial contributions may be made to Redeemer Lutheran Church at the above address or to your local animal shelter.