Mary Elizabeth “Betty” Sterling, a former antiques dealer who for many years lived in Hawaii, died of cancer at her home in Puhahou on July 18. She was 90.

As reported by The Honolulu Advertiser, Sterling was both a collector of art and antiques and a patron of the arts who served on the boards of the Hawaii Opera Theatre and the Honolulu Academy of Arts. She was also a member of the Chinatown Think Tank and The Contemporary Museum’s collections committee.

“She had a fabulous eye and was a good businesswoman. I once asked her how she chose pieces. She told me, ‘I walk in and my gut tells me. I’ve got to have a strong reaction to buy,'” her daughter, Susan Palmore of North Carolina, told Antiques and The Arts Weekly.

Born Mary Elizabeth Cunningham in Pittsburgh in 1916, Sterling graduated in 1937 from Smith College and worked for the Red Cross in Bridgeport during World War II. She also was a social worker and Democratic Party activist when she lived in Monroe, then Wilton, Conn., in the 1940s through 1960s.

With her second husband, Edward Sterling, she opened Brainstorm Farm Antiques in Randolph, Vt., specializing in early country furniture and folk art. Sterling also had a large collection of Native American art. She did business by appointment and participated in antiques shows around the country. Ron Bourgeault, at the time a young dealer from New Hampshire, was a good friend.

“My father was an invalid and couldn’t take winters in Vermont, so my parents moved to Hawaii, where I lived, in 1969,” Palmore explained. Sterling kept her New York apartment until two years ago. She closed her antiques business in 1982, after which her interest gravitated to contemporary Hawaiian art.

In addition to Palmore, Sterling is survived by her daughter Linda Barnes of Washington, D.C.; four grandchildren, Katherine Barnes, Davis Barnes, Michael Barnes and Jennifer Hoffman; and nine great-grandchildren.