Death of former adoptions officer who helped to shape hundreds of young lives

Gladys Whitaker worked as the Childcare and Adoptions Officer for the local authority in Burnley and the decisions she made affected the lives of many families.

Many of the children, whose lives she had helped to transform, remembered her, and she was often stopped in the street by people who wanted to thank her for the help and care she gave them when there may not have been anyone else around to look out for them.

Gladys loved the job even though she had to make some tough decisions that would have a lasting impact on families.

In one home she found a two-year-old boy who was so dirty his skin was biscuit coloured and he was so neglected he could hardly stand or walk. Gladys had no choice but to order that the child be taken into care, a decision she did not take lightly. But she knew it had been the right one when she saw the same child a couple of weeks later, running to her looking happy and healthy.

The tragic death of Jill, her eldest daughter, who was killed in a car accident when she was only 20, devastated Gladys so much she could no longer continue working with children and she gave up the job she had loved.

It took Gladys, who was the daughter of a Wesleyan minister, several years to come to terms with the loss of her daughter and she said it extinguished her "joy of life" for many years.

A woman ahead of her time, Gladys studied at Accrington Girls High School and had the opportunity to go to university.