LEWISTON — Betty Cody, the legendary RCA country music recording artist and mother of late guitar great Lenny Breau and accomplished guitarist/songwriter Denny Breau, died Tuesday night at home.

Her son said Wednesday that her death was expected. “She was 92. She would have been 93 in August. She was running out of gas,” said Denny Breau, who was with his mother when she died. “She was a sweetheart.”

Breau said his mother was a beloved entertainer who made thousands of people happy with her shows through the years.

“Also, she was the best mother you could have,” Breau said. “She gave up show business to come back to Maine. She turned down an offer from Elvis Presley’s (future) manager to come to Nashville.” She said no because she’d have to leave her sons behind.

Born Aug. 17, 1921, as Rita Cote in Sherbrooke, Canada, the daughter of Alphonse and Aidina Cote, she was the sixth of 11 children. She moved to Auburn when she was 9 months old.

At age 6, nuns at her French-speaking Catholic school recognized her talent and encouraged her to sing in the choir. Cody continued to sing in French until age 14.

At age 15, she gave her first professional appearance over WCOU Radio in Lewiston, for which she received a tremendous response, according to the Maine Country Music Hall of Fame.

She joined the Lone Pine and his Mountaineers in the 1940s and married musician Harold Breau, also known as Lone Pine. They performed throughout the United States and Canada. She perfected yodeling and considered it her trademark.

In 1952, Cody signed a recording contract with RCA and recorded more than 20 songs. Some of her hits included “I Really Want You to Know,” “Throw Away the Glass” and “Tom Tom Yodel.”

She performed on national radio, touring with the likes of Hank Snow, Chet Atkins, Minnie Pearl and Kitty Wells.

The couple had four sons. After Breau and Cody split up, she stopped performing nationally but continued in Maine and New England.

According to CMT’s Betty Cody bio, she reached the height of her career in the early 1950s, and considered a solo career about the time her marriage to Lone Pine was dissolving. She attracted the attention of Colonel Tom Parker, the future manager of Elvis Presley. She talked about that during a video posted to YouTube in 2010.

While touring in the South, “One day the colonel’s wife calls me. They had a big limousine,” Cody said in the video. “She said, ‘Come sit down with me, Betty. How would you like to come to Nashville and become a big star?’ It didn’t mean nothing to me.”

“I said, ‘I don’t know.’ She said, ‘You could live with us. … The colonel would really promote you. You’re a star now, but you could get bigger.’ She could tell I wasn’t that enthused. She said, ‘You’d have to leave your three boys for a while. Leave them in Maine.’

“I said, ‘No, I won’t do that no more.’ I had done it before to travel with Pine. So I didn’t go. I didn’t care. It was not in me to push myself to become a top star.”

Her focus was on her children. She opted to live in Auburn, work in the shoe shop and raise her sons. “That was quite a sacrifice for her to make,” Denny Breau said.

With their father, Harold Breau (Lone Pine) performing on the road, she took care of her family, her son said.

“She worked hard,” Breau said. “She made sure we always had new clothes.” Their home was happy. “She sang around the house all the time, played guitar. When people came to visit, they’d ask her to sing a song or two. She said, ‘Sure.’ She loved her yodeling.”

Cody continued to perform in New England. In 1979 she was inducted into the Maine Country Music Hall of Fame. She lived in Auburn for much of her life, and recently moved to Lewiston, her son said.

One of the last times she performed publicly was in 2012 when she appeared with Denny as part of the Breau family show at Lewiston’s Ramada Conference Center.

Before that performance, she told freelance writer David Sargent she had been singing since the age of 3, recalling her father’s fiddle-playing and her mother’s singing.

In that interview she told Sargent she was looking forward to the family show, running through a list of country songs she’d perform. She emphasized that she’d showcase her yodeling skills, which she called her trademark.

“Yesterday on her death bed we asked her to yodel,” Breau said Wednesday. “She tried her best, with a little smile.”

bwashuk@sunjournal.com