By REID TUCKER
Walton County midwife Gladys Milton was selected as the second DeFuniak Springs Woman’s Club “Woman of Light” for her contributions to local medicine and community advocacy.
Woman’s Club Treasurer Chris Guzowski, who spoke at the May 8 ceremony at which a plaque in honor of Milton was placed at the DeFuniak Springs Library, described the late Milton, who passed away in 1999, as a “strong and godly woman.” Milton became a licensed midwife in 1959, providing delivery services to low-income black women in the days of segregation. Over the course of a career spanning 40 years Milton delivered more than 3,000 babies throughout the Florida Panhandle and lower Alabama.
“She brought light into the world by bringing life into the world,” Guzowski said. “She was a mother of seven, but her life was dedicated to helping thousands of women become mothers themselves.”
Milton’s achievements didn’t stop at performing midwife services in her patients’ homes, as she founded the Milton Birthing Center in Flowersview in 1976, making it the first such facility of its kind in Walton County. Whether in the home or at her office, Milton also helped local women connect with social aid programs offered by area churches or civic groups, which led to a decades-long history of staunch advocacy for under-served populations in rural Walton County, particularly in the areas of literacy and historical preservation. Though she died before seeing it open, the Walton County Board of County Commissioners named the Gladys N. Milton Memorial Library, also in Flowersview, in her honor.
She was also the author of two autobiographies, Why Not Me? and Beyond the Storm, and she was inducted into the Florida Women’s Hall of Fame in 1994.
Milton’s daughter and fellow midwife Maria, who to this day runs the birthing center founded by her mother, spoke at the dedication ceremony, extolling her mother’s devout Christian faith and her equally devout service to the people of her community.
“My mother never did anything for the recognition,” she said. “She saw a service that needed doing, and she did it, giving God the glory in all things.”
