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<< Previous   of   Next >> Dan Bates / The Herald  (click to enlarge) Betty Mather, 89, (sitting) receives a warm embrace from co-worker Karen Kleinhans, 64, at her retirement and birthday party in the basement of the Everett Public Library on Wednesday. Kleinhans said Mather was more like her own mother than just a friend.   ADVERTISEMENT   CONTACT THE HERALD Robert Frank, City Editor frank@heraldnet.com   Published: Friday, August 15, 2008 Everett Public Library retiree no wallflower Twenty-two years ago, Betty Mather was excited to start her new job. Hired by the Everett Public Library, she helped with the bookmobile. As a page in the technical services department, she shelved new magazines and maintained the library's massive magazine archives. "I'm not a librarian. They call me the magazine maven," Mather said. "It's the best job I've ever had." She's had lots of jobs. At age 9, she earned money typing papers for University of California students in her hometown of Berkeley. During World War II, she worked in Oakland, Calif., for the Army Corps of Engineers. She spent decades working as a legal secretary. She raised three children, largely on her own, while her career Navy husband, Charles, was away on duty. Mather had already spent a lifetime working when, as a widow living in Everett, she walked into the library in the mid-1980s and asked for a job. At 67, she was past the age when most people retire. Twenty-two years later, on her 89th birthday Wednesday, Mather's co-workers said goodbye with a retirement and birthday party. It was standing-room-only in the main library's lower-level technical services area. Retired librarians, current employees, friends and Mather's grown children crowded around her for lunch, gifts and cake. When the bunch began singing "Happy Birthday to You," no one put a finger to lips in a librarian's gesture of "Shhhh." The best way to describe Mather's personality is to relate what she did as everyone sang "Happy Birthday." Did she sit at her lunch table, a little embarrassed, looking down at her cake? Not a chance. As the birthday song began, Mather jumped to her feet to lead the choir. She sang louder than anyone, clapping and laughing to the end. Longtime co-workers said that's typical of Mather, a tall, graceful woman who lives on her own in an Everett apartment, still drives, and loves to knit and do crossword puzzles. "She's always been that way," said Fran Habicht, the library's circulation manager. "She's a very grounded person, just a joy to be around." Mather has been working 21 hours a week, a schedule that has kept her busy and engaged with people of all ages. She's youthful enough that in her 80s, having admired a tattoo a teenage library page had, she decided to get a butterfly tattoo on her shoulder. Later, she added a tattoo of an Om symbol on the back of her neck. "She's so spiritual, she's almost psychic," said Mary Mayberry, who was Mather's supervisor before she herself retired. Reluctant to give up working, Mather said she's always been able to get another job, in a new city or new state. Now, her body is telling her it's time to quit. Stricken with a cold last year, she struggled to recover. She doesn't want her absences to burden co-workers. Her son Randy Mather, 62, has great respect for his mother's work ethic and all she's done. "This is the woman who brought us up," he said. "With our father away, she left a big imprint on us." Asked about his mom's tattoos and whether the label "free spirit" applies, Randy Mather shot back with a wry, "Ya think?" Life with her husband, who died of cancer in 1985, took her from California to Florida, Hawaii, New Jersey, Oregon and Alaska. She lived for a time on a 36-foot sailboat on Bainbridge Island, but a retirement cruise never happened. Joan Ames of Mukilteo hired Mather and worked with her on the bookmobile. "She had lost her husband, and had a daughter with special needs. They had planned a long sailing trip, but those retirement plans didn't materialize for her. She had reasons to be discouraged," said Ames, now retired. Then in 1986, Mather told Ames she had to have a reason to get up in the morning. "She was always upbeat," Ames said. The library hasn't seen the last of Betty Mather. There's time now to read the mysteries she loves. "When I come back to get books, I'll be looking at the magazines on the shelves, checking to see that they do it right," she said. Columnist Julie Muhlstein: 425-339-3460 or muhlstein@heraldnet.com.

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