Bette O'Brien

Bette M. O’Brien, 91, of Gulf Breeze, Florida, passed away Friday, October 18, 2019 comfortably under Covenant Hospice Care and in the compassionate care at Bay Breeze Nursing Home.

Bette was a daughter, sister, aunt, wife-widow, mother, and grandmother.  She was preceded in death by her mother, Martha and father, Ernest Jackson Paine, her husband John James Xavier O’Brien, and two brothers, Ernest Joseph Paine and Richard S. Paine.

She leaves behind eldest daughter, Karen “Kim” and her husband Robert Allen, youngest daughter, Robin and her husband Jamie Philips; only grandchildren Hailey and Ronald Jon “RJ” Philips. Other survivors include: one brother, William E. Paine; a loving cousin, Evelyn Levesque; and Lida Fernald; plus, many extended family and friends.

Bette told the story that she met J.J. “Johnny” O’Brien on the Cape (Cape Canaveral, Merritt Island, Florida) while she was working as part of the Polaris Program (1959) for Lockheed Missiles and Space Company (now Lockheed Martin). He, a veteran, at the time was working as a contracted scientific engineer for General Dynamics and participated in many launches among the historic launch at the Kennedy Space Center (later IBM). However, her greatest desire was to marry someone she loved and to have children of her own to become a mother and homemaker, which she accomplished two-fold in 1961, and again in 1963.

She also loved and cared for her two grandchildren while they grew up within walking distance of her home. Her grandchildren spent after school time at “Silly Grandmas” (a term of supreme endearment) at her house in Gulf Breeze, Florida.

Memorial service will be held for family and friends at 11:00 a.m., on Friday, November 29, at Rose Lawn Funeral Home in Gulf Breeze, Florida. In December, her final wishes will be honored as her ashes are laid next to her mother and father in her last place of rest at the Florida Memorial Gardens in Rockledge, Florida.

In lieu of flowers, we ask that to honor Bette you might consider donating to the Multiple Sclerosis Foundation: https://msfocus.org/Donate.