Elizabeth Tower

Longtime Alaskan Dr. Elizabeth Ann Tower, 84, died Sept. 27, 2010, at her home in Anchorage.

Her remains will be cremated and a stone erected in her memory in the Pioneer section of the Anchorage Municipal Cemetery. A celebration of her life will be held in December at the Kincaid Chalet.

Elizabeth (Betsy) Tower was born Aug. 1, 1926, to Edna and Robert Bingham of Shaker Heights, Ohio. She attended the Laurel School in Shaker Heights and Vassar College, from which she graduated Phi Beta Kappa after three years, in 1947. She then attended medical school at Western Reserve (now known as Case Western Reserve), graduating in 1951.

Betsy was married in 1949 to John C. Tower. Both Betsy and John completed medical internships and residencies at Grace New Haven Hospital in New Haven, Conn., where their first child, Christina, was born in 1953.

After completing their medical training, in 1954 the Towers moved to Anchorage at the urging of pioneer Alaska physician Dr. C. Earl Albrecht. Their first home and office was on Second Avenue in downtown Anchorage. While raising four children, Betsy began a varied career in medicine and public health.

In her early career, Betsy briefly practiced medicine at the Anchorage Medical and Surgical Clinic. For many years, she served as public health officer for Southcentral Alaska, supervising Alaska public health nurses in Southcentral Alaska, Southwestern Alaska and the Aleutians. During her 25-year career with the Alaska Division of Public Health, she traveled widely in Bush Alaska and developed a statewide vaccination program for hepatitis B.

Betsy and John both fully embraced their new life in Alaska. They were enthusiastic supporters of the statehood movement. They both earned pilot's licenses and enjoyed hunting and fishing. In 1959, they built the first of several recreational cabins at Christiansen Lake near Talkeetna, which their children and grandchildren continue to enjoy. They formed lifetime friendships with many other young couples who came to Anchorage before statehood and shared the challenges and adventures of Alaska's first 50 years of statehood.

After retiring from the Alaska Division of Public Health in 1986, Betsy pursued her longstanding interest in history and writing. She received the Alaska Historical Society's 1996 Historian of the Year award for her book "Icebound Empire," a history of the Kennecott Copper Co. She also wrote biographies of notable Alaskans Sheldon Jackson, Stephen Birch, Michael Heney, Austin E. "Cap" Lathrop and William Egan; a guide to skiing in Alaska; a history of Anchorage; a novel set in the Aleutians; and several prize-winning magazine articles. Her most recent book, "Over the Back Fence," is a history of the Canadian-American border and reflects her longstanding interest in and admiration for Canada. In 2004, she established the Elizabeth Tower Endowment in support of the UAA Canadian Studies program.

Involved in many community activities, Betsy was a founding member and past president of the Nordic Skiing Association of Anchorage and a longtime member and past president of the Cook Inlet Historical Society.

Family and friends remember Betsy as a person of many and diverse athletic, artistic and other talents. She enjoyed downhill and cross-country skiing, tennis, golf and swimming, and was an active golf and tennis player well into her 80s. Her annual woodcut Christmas cards told the story of Alaska from statehood through the earthquake, the Iditarod, the pipeline, the oil spill and much more. On patriotic occasions, she would recite the Gettysburg Address while standing on her head.

In 2010, Betsy was inducted into the Alaska Women's Hall of Fame, which celebrates women who have shaped the state.

Betsy is survived by her husband of 61 years, Dr. John C. Tower of Anchorage; her children and their spouses, Chris Tower Zafren and Dr. Ken Zafren, Dr. Stephen S. Tower and Janice Tanaka Tower, and Alice Tower Knapp and Gunnar Knapp of Anchorage and Charles Cramton Tower of Valdez; and her six grandchildren, Jonathan James Tower, Elizabeth Baldwin Knapp, Dana Rose Tower, Christina Paulsen Knapp, Nathaniel Tower Knapp and Rachel Alicia Zafren.

Her family has established a Nordic Skiing Association of Anchorage scholarship in her memory.