Gladys Irene Piker Perkins was born April 9, 1927 in Bradford, Arkansas, the daughter of Newton Adley and Evadeen Piker. Her childhood was spent in poverty on a family farm with her father and many siblings, who she “had the most love possible for” (her own written words).
On a rainy day in rural Arkansas soon after her twelfth birthday, Gladys lay down under a large hickory nut tree and wondered if she was old enough to be saved. Determined to hear from the Lord, she prayed for several hours before she heard Him say to her: “You call upon Me and I call upon you.” After her public profession of faith at a travelling Brush Arbor revival, Gladys never wavered in her love of Jesus Christ and her desire for others to know Him.
Through most of her early adulthood, Gladys travelled around the globe as an Army wife to William D. Williams, with whom she had three children who she loved with the deepest conviction to be a good mother: As Bill, Pat, and Sheila were growing, she was faithful to “teach [God’s words and commands] diligently unto [her] children” and to devote herself to giving them a sincere love for worship (Deuteronomy 6:6-7).
Gladys was wholly dedicated as a mother and homemaker, but her childhood dream to become a nurse was not realized until after her 45th birthday. With only an eighth-grade education, she was able to graduate from college as a Registered Nurse and show the most outstanding care and compassion for all those she served with mercy and humility.
Her nursing career was exceptional and heartfelt, but her Greatest Legacy was her passion to “seek out ... people to witness to about becoming a Christian”. This love she had for soul-winning and the Great Commission led to her involvement in the mission church plant that is now Hunter Road Baptist Church in Cataula, Georgia.
Gladys was a humble woman of many talents and interests and when asked what she would want her descendants to know about her, she answered, “I love the Lord, picnics, old friends, gardening, art work, nursing, children, sewing, and needle work.”
Gladys’ favorite Bible verse, Micah 6:8, was the pattern for her life. As Gladys herself wrote so many years ago, “And to think, it all started with a fervent conversation with the Lord underneath an old hickory nut tree.”
Gladys’ family that she loved so dearly includes her son, William (Bill) D. Williams, Jr. (Sharon), and 2 daughters, Patricia "Pat" Jane Farmer (Steve), and Sheila Kay Battles (Bobby), 9 grandchildren, 22 great-grandchildren, and four great-great-grandchildren.
