Wilma Priddy to Celebrate 100th Birthday!

Wilma Priddy will be turning 100 years old on Tuesday, June 8, and has spent most of her lifetime in the Amherst community.

She was born at Hobart, Okla. on June 8, 1921, and was 15 when the Ellis family moved to Amherst—just east of the Amherst School building, which was much smaller than the current campus. She has observed the current buildings as they were added.

From Oklahoma, the family aimed to arrive at Muleshoe, but stopped to get gasoline for the car at Earth, where they met John Sulser and his family, who had “a square mile of cotton that needed to be pulled.”

Her father, Jim Ellis became a farmer and cotton ginner, and her mother Lorella Ellis, did quilting for the public.

After she and her four brothers pulled cotton there, they were hired to pull cotton for farmers at Springlake, Anton, and towards the Muleshoe area.

While doing that, they found the home in Amherst, where she grew up, attended school, and graduated from Amherst High School.

She said she “was kidnapped” by Eugene Priddy for marriage, a week before the end of school.

She said he got her to go into the County Clerk’s office with him one day, where some papers were signed by both of them, and Priddy put it in his pocket.

On the next Sunday, a May 7, she went with Priddy to the First Baptist Church in Amherst, and following the message, Priddy caught her by her arm and they went to the front for the marriage.

Monday, she had to go back to school for a week before she graduated.

“Everything has gone real smoothly throughout my life,” she admits, noting that both of her parents liked Eugene Priddy.

Most of her life, 45 years of it, was devoted to nursing in Lamb County, after she had earned her Registered Vocational Nurse Certification. She first worked for Dr. McDaniel, Dr. Birdsong, and Dr. Clements, and when they left, she began working between Littlefield and Amherst with Dr. Chatwell.

She worked as a nurse, until she was 86 years old, and after that, she worked as a greeter and secretary at Hammons Funeral Home for six years, and later at Hospitality House Nursing Home.

In all that time, she raised three sons, and a daughter.

Since she married, she was a very active member of the Amherst First Baptist Church. She was involved with the Women’s Missionary Union, taught Sunday School, served as Intermediate Sunday School Superintendent, and participated in many other church activities.

Her four children have given her 6 grandchildren, and 13 greatgrandchildren, She assured: “It’s been a wonderful life, with some ups and downs, but I’ve made it.”

After her interview Thursday afternoon, she repeated one of her favorite sayings about having a long life: “Clean living, work hard, love the Lord, and that will get you through this life.”

A Birthday Parade around the Harmonee House Nursing Facility in Amherst, will begin on her birthday, at 2 p.m. Tuesday, June 8. Line-up for the parade will begin at 1:30 p.m. at the Amherst Gin