Founder of Lori Knapp Companies to turn 100 this Sunday
Bette (Knapp) Bushnell will turn 100 years old on Sunday, May 10. She may have to video chat with her loved ones on her birthday, but the hope is that the family can celebrate more grandly, together, later in June.
By Correne Martin
Bette (Knapp) Bushnell can now add living during the coronavirus pandemic to her list of life’s accomplishments over the course of the past century. She will turn 100 on May 10.
A current resident at Bluff Haven Assisted Living in Prairie du Chien, Bette will hopefully celebrate by video chatting with some of her children. Then, maybe later in June, there will be a big family celebration. Until then, cards are welcome at 720 S. Fremont St., Apt. 704.
Bette Rheo made a grand entrance into the world on 5-10-20 (1920) in Platteville.
She went to high school there, where she was a drum major, and graduated from the Platteville State Teachers College with a three-year teacher’s degree. She went back for her bachelor’s degree.
Her first teaching job was at Argyle with 42 first and second graders in one room.
“They were a great class. They wanted to learn,” she recalled.
Years later, in 2000, Bette would earn her master’s degree in ministry, as well, from the Christian Life School of Theology.
In 1942, Bette married WWII serviceman Don Knapp in California. They moved to Prairie du Chien in 1945, where they started Knapp Floor Company in the back of the Courier Press. At first, Bette also taught third grade at the Prairie du Chien grade school.
Bette and Don had four children, Don (Sandy), Nancy (Lowell) Ahrens, Lori, the namesake of their beloved venture, and Randy (Stacy).
In 1959, their business became Knapp’s Home Furnishings in the Commerce Court Mall, where Suppz Gym is located today.
“I was the drapery lady,” she said. “Of course, Tiller’s Furniture was also in town then. There were enough customers for both of us.”
The home store closed in 1984—12 years after the couple had started Lori Knapp Companies, on Cass Street, with the very first home for developmentally disabled students in Wisconsin.
“Lori was up in Madison (in more of an institution) because she wasn’t eating well. They got her healthy,” Bette remembered. “We wanted to get her back home. So we brought her and seven others home to Prairie. There was eight at that first Lori Knapp home.”
Then, the Knapps developed homes just like it all over the country. “It was a new way of living for them, in a home setting,” she said.
When Don passed away in 1991, Bette remarried his best friend, Guerdon Bushnell, in 1994. She was 74 years old. He had been a childhood friend and fellow churchgoer of hers. She gained four children, along with four grandchildren with that marriage.
She and Guerdon lived in Lafayette, La., from 1994-2001, and pastored there most of those years. They moved back to Prairie du Chien in 2001, lived in Kramer’s trailer court, and began working at Lori Knapp Companies. The couple was married 17 years until his passing in 2011.
Since, she lived at Rivercrest apartments, until last year, when she moved into Bluff Haven. She said she loves it there.
Over the years, when she wasn’t working or raising children, Bette enjoyed playing her Hammond organ, especially when her daughter, Nancy, played along with the autoharp. She also had fun creating stained glass work and quilting.
In total, Bette has 10 grandchildren, 22 great-grandchildren and nine great-great-grandchildren.
“She’s a great family and Christian woman. She’s very talented, upbeat and kind,” son, Don, shared.
Reflecting on turning 100 this Sunday, Bette said, “I’ve never thought about age, honestly. I just lived each year, one at a time. I’m very well. I have family and friends. I’ve reached the point where, if I pass away, I know where I’m going.”
She shared her best advice to a long and happy life: “Put God first. He takes care of you and gives you blessings.”
Bette is grateful for her sons who call her every day or night to check in and say hello, especially now that the coronavirus concerns have caused a “no visiting” rule at Bluff Haven.
“I miss people so much,” she stated. “But, when you get to be 100, you don’t want any part of anything that’s difficult.”
Whether she gets a huge celebration this year for her birthday milestone or not, Bette believes she’ll have more opportunities.
She laughed, sweetly, “I plan to live to be 120.”
