Martha Beatrice Bates Naylor, 85, passed away Saturday, February 1, 2014, at the Courtyards Community Living Center. She was born August 21, 1928, in Star, Miss., to Hughie George Bates, Sr., and Ethel Smith Bates. She received her education at Blue Mountain, Mississippi College, and Mississippi State University. She taught at Forest Park, Ga, and spent 30 years teaching music in the Itawamba County school system. She was a long-time member of Trinity Baptist Church where she served as organist and choir director and attended Itawamba Christian Church. She enjoyed crocheting, knitting, traveling, and ballroom dancing.
Services will be at 2 p. m. Sunday, February 2, at the McNeece-Morris Funeral Home Chapel in Fulton with Bro. Jim Wismer officiating. Burial will be in the Itawamba Memorial Gardens.
Survivors include her husband, Alan T. Naylor, of Fulton; three daughters, Deborah Huffman (Gary) of Woodland, Kathy Robakiewicz (Dane) of Oxford, and Gail Farris (Manuel) of Seymour, Mo.; her step-children, Victoria Blake (Robert), Julia Bean (Graham), and Clayton, Tammy, and Sarah Alice Turner; one brother, Hughie George Bates, Jr., of D’Iberville; 7 grandchildren, 6 great-grandchildren; 13 step-grandchildren; and 9 step great-grandchildren.
She was preceded in death by two husbands, William Thomas Bullard and Jim Turner; and her parents.
Visitation will be from noon until service time Sunday at the funeral home.
In lieu of flowers, memorials may be made to a charity of the donor’s choice.
