Shawnee's own Betty Katherine Permetter Falato will tell her story and discuss her journey from rural Oklahoma to Washington, D.C. for a career with Federal Aviation Administration.
Betty Katherine Permetter Falato grew up in Earlboro, OK and is the author of three books about inter-race relations and education in Oklahoma. Her fourth book co-authored with her husband Adam Falato, Black Interpreters Living Among the Absentee Shawnee Indians in Early Central Oklahoma: the Chronicles of William Ellsworth Shawnee, is set to be published in 2019.
Betty retired from the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) in 2007 as a senior system engineer for the National Airspace System. Betty holds a bachelor's in mathematics and a master's in human relations from the University of Oklahoma, and a master's in Civil Engineering from the University of California at Berkley. During her career in air transportation, Betty served at various FAA locations and at the Office of the Secretary of Transportation in Washington, D.C.