Betty Dutcher & Emylou Keith Business Faculty Support Fund

When Emylou Keith graduated from the University of Wichita in 1950 alongside her beloved sister, Betty, they were two of only a handful of women in the GI-dominated graduating class. Both sisters previously had graduated from Wesley Hospital’s nursing school and had served as 2nd Lieutenants in the Army Nurse Corp during World War II.

At the University of Wichita, Mrs. Keith earned a degree in psychology and then began a long career in nursing administration in Missouri, eventually becoming executive director of the Missouri State Board of Nursing. She married Farris Keith in 1956. Mrs. Dutcher and her husband, Charles, were early entrepreneurs in Wichita, owning and operating the Dupaco Paint Company.

Upon Mrs. Dutcher’s death in 2001, Mrs. Keith established an estate gift to support faculty in the W. Frank Barton School of Business. This fund provides resources to be used at the discretion of the Barton School dean to support faculty development, supplement salaries and purchase materials and equipment. Mrs. Keith died in 2017 at the age of 93.