Sheryl Lynne Nelms-Pennington

Sheryl Lynne Nelms-Pennington, 80, died Friday, October 10, 2025, at Hendrick Hospice, Abilene, Texas. A memorial service will be held at 1:00 p.m. Friday, November 21 at Bailey-Howard Funeral Home in Clyde, Texas with Pastor Jimmy Hatcher officiating.

Sheryl Nelms was born December 3, 1944, in Marysville, Kansas, to Edwin and Margaret Nelms, while Edwin was serving as a radio man in the U.S. Army in the South Pacific. Sheryl graduated from South Dakota State University with honors in 1979. She was a member of Kappa Delta Pi national teacher honorary society, Pi Gamma Mu national sociology honorary and Phi Upsilon Omicron national home economics honorary. She was an insurance claims adjuster from 1983 to 2009 and an insurance agent from 2009 to 2025.

Sheryl was also a freelance writer, a teacher of writing workshops and a poet from 1977 until her death. She has had over 6,200 stories, articles and poems published in textbooks, anthologies, state student evaluation tests, magazines and newspapers. Her poem "Outhouse Blues" is on an outhouse display in Yosemite National Park. She was editor, contributing editor, essay editor and fiction/nonfiction editor, staff writer and freelance writer for various magazines and newspapers.

Twenty books of her poetry have been published, including one of the most recent, No Hats Or Bib Overalls On Dance Night, Drury Publishing. She was nominated four times for the Pushcart Prize. Sheryl donated her body of work to be archived at South Dakota State University, and her poetry will soon be accessible online at https://www.sdstate.edu/sdsu-archives-special-collections/south-dakota-poetry.

She was a member of the Abilene Writers Guild in Abilene, Texas, Trinity Writer's Workshop in Bedford, Texas, the Society of Southwestern Authors in Tucson, Arizona and The National League of American Pen Women in Washington, D.C. She enjoyed traveling, camping, fishing and dirt biking.

Sheryl married Danny C. Pennington in 1986. Her previous marriage was to Ed Baker from 1963 to 1984. She was preceded in death by her parents, Margaret and Edwin Nelms and nephew, Matthew Nelms.

She is survived by her loving family, including her devoted husband, Danny C. Pennington, her brother, Eugene E. Nelms, her children, Julie L. (Paul) Hartmann, Ben E. (Michelle) Baker, David A. (Jamie) Baker, her step-children Dana (Tim) Miller, Sonya Roemisch, Jonathan Pennington and thirteen grandchildren, Crystal (Kerrington) Espinosa, Joe (Kennedy) Hartmann, Ben Hartmann, Tanner (Hope) Miller, Louis Hartmann, Josh Baker, Zach Baker, Alena (Austin) Gipson, Megan Miller, Destiny Miller, Garner Baker, Preston Powell, Phylicia (Mark) Faur and five great-grandchildren, Emerson Hartmann, Theodore Espinosa, Ellie Espinosa, John Faur and Lucy Faur.

Sheryl donated her body to Texas Health Medical Science Research in Lubbock in hopes that a cure would be found soon for Parkinson's patients.

Memorial contributions can be made to South Dakota State University Foundation Scholarship Fund, 815 Medary Box 525, Brookings, South Dakota 57006, (888) 747-7378.