Betty Ann Bruno obituary & net worth at death

Betty Ann Bruno was an American reporter and television host who worked for KTVU-Channel 2 in San Francisco for over 20 years, until her retirement in 1992.

Betty Ann Bruno Obituary & net worth at Death

Her years as a child actor included work as a Munchkin in “The Wizard of Oz.” Bay Area residents know her as a socially conscious KTVU reporter who began her 20-year career with a five-part series on local prostitution problems and memorably went on television to comment on the loss of her own home in the 1991 Oakland Hills fire.

But the moment that shaped her adult life happened in her 20s, away from the TV lights and sets, when she met hula instructor Ida Namanu’okawa’a Wong Gonsalves.

“She was one of the most graceful dancers I had ever seen and one of the sweetest, most giving individuals I will ever know,” Bruno remembers.

Decades later, Betty Ann Ka’ihilani Bruno followed Wong’s path, spreading the love of hula. Now 80 years old, Bruno has found her island paradise in Sonoma, leading the performance group Hula Mai, which practices out of the Vintage House Senior Center.

Born to a Chinese Hawaiian mother and a Dutch Irish father, Bruno spent her formative years feeling like a stranger in her own skin. When she learned to dance as a child in the 1930s, it was because Hollywood filmmakers wanted little hula girls. Her mother denied her Chinese heritage and didn’t teach her the Hawaiian ways.

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