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Helms stays the course, promoted to Glory
With family and friends at his side, Major Gordon Helms was promoted to Glory on Sept. 16 in Los Angeles, after a long fight with cancer.
Gordon LeRoy Helms was born in Riverside, Calif. on Oct. 2, 1936 to Salvationist parents Paul and Daisy Helms. In 1942 the family moved to Santa Monica and soldiered at the corps there. After graduating from high school, Gordon attended Pacific Bible College, now Azusa Pacific University. He joined the U.S. Air Force in 1956.
In 1958 Gordon married Margaret (Peggy) Farnsworth, a soldier at the Pasadena Corps. After Gordon’s honorable discharge from the Air Force, the family moved to Santa Monica where Gordon worked for the U.S. Postal Service.
In 1962, Gordon and Peggy entered officers’ training in San Francisco, joining the Proclaimers of the Faith Session (1963-1965). They were sent out in 1964 as Cadet-Lieutenants to Pendleton, Ore., where they returned after being commissioned in 1965.
An appointment in Caldwell, Idaho, followed in 1969. Here Gordon completed a BA degree in Christian education from Northwest Nazarene College.
Gordon and Peggy served throughout the West as corps officers, in divisional appointments and at the School for Officers’ Training.
In 1996, their son Lt. Drew Helms was promoted to Glory in Fremont, Calif. After his death, the Helms were appointed to Hayward, Calif. where Peggy joined daughter-in-law Lt. Nancy Helms as associate corps officer and Gordon served with the Del Oro Division.
The Helms joined the Western Territory’s pastoral care department in 1998. They retired in 2001 and soon moved to Bakersfield, Calif.
Gordon is survived by his wife Peggy; his sons Paul, Derek and Craig; grandchildren Reagan, Nicholas, Preston, Cameron, Austin, Katie, Dalton and Quinton; and siblings Ray, Stan, Doreen and Terry.
Celebration of life services were held at the Pasadena Tabernacle Corps and at the Slavic Christian Center in Tacoma, Wash. Interment was at the Haven of Rest in Gig Harbor, Wash.
Messages may be sent to Major Peggy Helms at 4608 Remington Park Dr., Bakersfield, CA 93312.
In lieu of flowers, the family requests donations be made to: Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, c/o Dr. Michael Lill, Director of Hematology Oncology, Blood and Marrow Transplant, 8700 Beverly Blvd., Suite 5540, Los Angeles, CA 90048
Captain Bertil L. Gotrich was promoted to Glory on August 31, 2003.
Bertil was born in Landskrona, Sweden on June 13, 1915 to Salvationist parents, and entered the training college in Stockholm in 1934, in the Fishers of Men Session. He was commissioned the following year and sent to Visby, Gotland, in the first of a number of corps appointments.
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