Ms. Betty J. Larkin

Betty Jane Larkin, 84, died Saturday, March 17, 2012, in Houston, TX. She was born Irmgard Betty Jane Elsie Volkmann on February 4, 1928, in Dallas, TX, to Ernst Wilhelm Karl Volkmann and Elsie Martha Antonie (aka Elsie Clara) (Hallmann) Volkmann.

Betty Jane worked as a PBX operator for KGUL and KHOU TV stations in Houston and later retired from the City of Houston Municipal Court after 19 years as manager of the traffic ticket department. She had a strong work ethic, a great sense of humor, and loved to garden, ballroom dance, fish, rock hound, listen to classical and German music, and photograph friends and nature. Whenever there was an opportunity to have a good time or learn something new, she took it.

Betty Jane is survived by her two daughters, Emily Jane Williams of Chico, CA and Marilyn Lucille Williams Rodrigues of Arizona; her son Henry A. Roberts and wife Claudia of Chattanooga, TN; her sister Irma M. (Doris Margarete Irma) Volkmann of Chico, CA; and her brother Helmut Hermann Ernst Volkmann and wife Magdalene of Horn-Bad Meinberg, Germany. She is also survived by her five granddaughters and one grandson Lorraine Stephens of San Diego, CA; Christine Lomas of Saint Louis, MO; Heather Coleman of New Orleans, LA; and Taylor Rae, Jessica Joanne and Philip Marc Roberts of Chattanooga, TN.

Her parents, her brothers Henry Harold Werner Volkmann and Walter Herbert Arthur Volkmann of Dallas, TX, and her brother Gerhard Martin Herbert Volkmann (and wife Ida Geron) of Daly City, CA, predeceased her. She is also predeceased by former husbands Thomas Berry Williams, Jr., Enoch John Roberts and Thomas D. Larkin.

Graveside services will be held at 11:00am on Tuesday, March 27, 2012, at Grove Hill Memorial Park. Arrangements are under the direction of Grove Hill Funeral Home, 3920 Samuell Blvd., Dallas, TX.