Gladys Ellen Zerkel Atkins passed away April 10, 2022 at 101 years of age, with her family at her side, at her daughter’s home in Hawk Point, where she lived her last years.
Gladys Atkins
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She was the older of two children born to Jessie Mae Coberly and Carl Oscar Zerkel on May 26, 1920 in Humansville. She grew up on the family farm in Dunnegan, where she attended elementary and high school. She attended college at Southwest Baptist College in Bolivar, where she met her husband, James Wiley Atkins II in 1937. They were married from 1940 until his death in 1964.
Gladys loved learning and was a born teacher, pursuing a teaching career from the age of 18 until her retirement at age 72 from Adams Junior High in Trenton, where she taught reading from 1971 to 1992.
She loved music of all kinds and, from a young age, played piano and organ for churches everywhere she lived. She was a member of Hodge Presbyterian Church in Trenton where she played the organ for her church family for over 25 years.
Gladys had numerous and diverse interests that kept her engaged in life and young at heart. She was a voracious reader of all subject matter from politics to poetry, and was never without a stack of books, magazines and newspapers within reach. She was a longtime member of the Trenton Shakespearean Circle. She loved being outdoors and, as a gardener, surrounded herself with plants and flowers. Most of all she loved spending time with her family.
She is survived by her sister, Florence Youngblood of Kearney; daughter Nancy Groepper (Kerry) of Hawk Point; son Carl David Atkins of Cape Girardeau; daughter, Laura Milton (Zenapha) of Lakeland, FL; nephew Kent Youngblood (Sandy) of Kearney; eight grandchildren, Kristena Rickerson of Trenton, Erik Krager of Riverview, FL, Crystal Monahan (Mark Hudoba) of Preston Hollow, NY, Carly Winter (Woody) of Cape Girardeau, Roxanne Magill (Bill), Jessica Atkins of Cape Girardeau, Kimberly Hernandez (Greighton) of Winter Haven, FL, Andrea Cooley (Jason) of Edmonds, WA; along with eight great-grandchildren; three great-great-grandchildren; two great-nieces; and two great- great-nieces.
Gladys was preceded in death by her parents Carl and Jessie Zerkel; her husband, James Wiley Atkins II; a son, James Wiley Atkins III; a daughter, Ellen Rickerson; and a daughter-in-law Rebecca Atkins.
Memorial services will be held at 2 p.m., on Saturday, May 28, 2022 at Hodge Presbyterian Church in Trenton.
