Bettye Sue Kline, a community leader and merchant, whose store had a reputation for elegant and stylish women’s wear, died Sunday at her home at the age of 77.

“It’s kind of hard to sum Bettye Sue up, she’s just a all around good person,” said Nancy Braddock. “She’s very much a lady.”

Born to Sam F. Lamensdorf Sr. and Susie Bell Lamensdorf of Rolling Fork, Kline attended school in Rolling Fork, graduating from Rolling Fork High School in 1957. She enrolled at the University of Alabama, where she attended for two years before her marriage to Stanley B. Kline on Nov. 29, 1959.

She founded the Bettye K Shoppe in 1970, an upscale women’s clothing store on Washington Street in downtown Vicksburg, which she operated until retiring in 1995.

“She had a store that was just wonderful,” Leslie Marcus said. “I found all of my clothes there, I could find anything there. She had good taste; very elegant taste. Her store was very popular. She was on one side of Washington Street and then she moved to the other side. She had good-looking clothes.

“She was a good person and a wonderful friend to me. I’m going to miss her.”

“She was able to tell a wonderful story,” said Suzanne Braddock. “She was a just a good special, thoughtful friends. She could tell a joke just so good, and it was funny.

“She knew not just style, but other things, like the new music, the new movies — she always knew what was going on. But of course, that probably came from her successful career with the Bettye K Shoppe. She was just a special friend and I’m going to miss her.”

“We were good friends, first and foremost,” Ballard said. “She was a good friend and a friend to many people. She did a lot for the community. She was very active in a lot of civic organizations. She was supportive of the community of her friends, and the city in so many things. She had the shop for years. She came into contact with so many people that way.”

Ballard recalled she met Kline while attending temple.

“We attended temple together on Friday night. I guess we’ve known each other for a very long time, but when we started going to temple, it evolved into a real close friendship,” Ballard said.

“She means an awful lot to our family, she and Stan had spent holidays with us, particularly Thanksgiving and Easter. They’re very much a part of our family.”

Kline was a longtime board member of the Southern Cultural Heritage Foundation, where she served as vice president. She was appointed by Gov. Phil Bryant to serve on the Mississippi Commission on the Holocaust, and had been a member of Anshe Chesed Congregation since 1962.

She served on the congregation’s Board of Trustees, was president of the Temple Sisterhood, and served as secretary-treasurer of the congregation.

“She and Stan both were wonderful people, but she was so caring and she loved the foundation and cared so much about its well-being along with the other people and every thing that went around it,” said Annette Kirklin, executive director of the Vicksburg Convention Center and former director of the Southern Cultural Heritage Foundation. “Not only was she a dedicated person to the foundation when I was there, but she was just a dear, dear friend and loved by so many and going to be truly missed. It breaks my heart.”