Betty Bishop 'has been happily married for fifty years' [in 2002] and has seven children and a number of grandchildren and great-grandchildren. She has stood for Parliament twice. In 1983 she commenced tertiary study and started writing after joining a writing class with WEA in 1985. She belongs to a small writing group which, with her family, is very supportive.
Betty Bishop was one of a collective of SA writers who wrote under the pseudonym 'Penelope Ashe'. In 1989 she won the Sunday Mail short story award and was runner-up in the C. J. Dennis Award for short stories. Several of her unpublished short stories have been Commended in the National Literary Awards anthology section, 1997-1999 and elsewhere. She has had work published in London and New York.
Betty's other interestes include art. She has exhibited widely and has had a solo exhibition at Lombard Art Gallery in Magill, SA.
