Visitation will be this Sunday, April 14th, from 2PM to 5PM at Riverwood Family Funeral Service on Hwy 51 just south of Hwy 84.
A funeral service will be held here in Brookhaven at Riverwood on Monday at 10AM. The graveside service will be held at Clear Creek Church near Brooklyn, Mississippi, at 3PM.
The Reverend Dr. Billy Frank Gerald, long time resident of Brookhaven, MS, passed away peacefully in his home on April 11th at the age of 87. He leaves behind his wife of 66 years,
Fay Ivey Gerald, and their six children: Judy Ratcliff (Scott), Larry Gerald (Delores Myers), Cindy Smith (Oscar), Keith Gerald (Aimee), James Gerald (Emily Dabney), and Sharon Gerald.
The family also includes 14 grandchildren, and 21 great-grandchildren.
Born August 19th, 1931, in Greene County, MS, to Claude Frank and Rosa Holder Gerald, Dr. Gerald was the third of eleven children. He joins his parents in the Promised Land,
along with his siblings Gayle, Nell, Sam, and Ben. His surviving siblings are John, Ralph, Patricia, Paul, Sandra, and Darlene.
Ordained as a minister on December 4th, 1949 by the Methodist Protestant Conference of Mississippi, Dr. Gerald attended Kletzing College at University Park, Iowa,
Asbury Theological Seminary in Wilmore, Kentucky, and graduate school at the University of Southern Mississippi in Hattiesburg, Mississippi. Additionally, he held a lifetime
teaching certification in secondary education from the State of Mississippi.
As a minister, he pastored 18 different churches during his career, planted 4 Methodist Protestant churches, and founded several independent Methodist congregations.
His ministry included 3 years as President of the Methodist Protestant Conference of Mississippi, 8 years on the Board of Religious Education for the General Conference
as well as 6 years on the Board of Missions. He served for 10 years on the Board of the World Gospel Mission from 2000 to 2010.
As an educator, he taught and served as an administrator in several high schools around the state, but he is most remembered for his years at Whitworth College in Brookhaven, MS.
There, from 1960 to 1976 as first Dean and then President, he helped mold the next generation of both preachers and teachers, raised children,
and become a member of the community he loved. Many in Brookhaven will also remember him as the owner of the WCHJ and WBKN radio stations.
Most importantly, as a husband, father, grandfather, and great-grandfather, he showered everyone with love, lived the example we were to follow, and shared his deep devotion to God.
We followed him as he whistled gospel tunes, walked in his footsteps in the fresh tilled soil of his garden, and counted pine trees with him in the woods of south Mississippi.
His love of growing things was so great that the Lincoln County and Southwest Districts of the Mississippi Forestry Association both recognized him as the 2013
Tree Farmer of the Year. In their words, there were planters with more trees, but he was the only one that knew them all by name.
The family asks that, in lieu of flowers or other gifts, you donate to one of Dr. Gerald’s two favorite charities:
the World Gospel Mission (www.wgm.org) headquartered in Marion, Indiana, or the Wesley Biblical Seminary
(www.wbs.edu) in Ridgeland, Mississippi.
