Nina Raye Phagan Pinkston, veteran missionary and longtime Woman’s Missionary Union leader, died Dec. 2 Grayson, Ga., due to complications of breast cancer. She was 89. She moved to Georgia to be near family about 18 months ago after nearly 50 years in Fort Worth, where she and her husband Glen both earned master’s degrees in religious education from Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary and where they were longtime members of Travis Avenue Baptist Church. She was born in Bellevue to Wade Ray Lona and Lona Louville Phagan on Dec. 30, 1929. In 1944, her family moved to Perryton, where her father served as Ochiltree County sheriff for 26 years. She graduated from Perryton High School, attended Wayland Baptist College and graduated from Texas Tech University. At Wayland, she met Glen Pinkston of Levelland, and they married in Perryton. When he re-enlisted in the U.S. Air Force and was stationed in Japan, she traveled aboard a troop transport ship to join him. Over the next 31 years, they lived in Japan, Ohio, Nebraska, England, California, West Germany and finally at Carswell Air Force Base in Fort Worth. After his retirement, they moved to West Germany to serve as Southern Baptist missionaries more than 10 years, helping grow Baptist churches near U.S. military bases across Europe and serving as religious education consultants for the European Baptist Convention. They averaged more than 60,000 miles a year traveling to churches. During one trip, they suffered a serious car accident, in which she broke her neck and collar bone. With much prayer, great medical treatment and hard work, she recovered and continued mission work in Europe. She served in leadership roles both with national WMU and Texas WMU. She was preceded in death by her husband Glen in 2017. She is survived by sons Michael Pinkston of Plano and Steven Pinkston of Grayson, Ga.; five grandchildren; and a brother, Jim Phagan of Carrollton. A memorial service is scheduled at 11 a.m. on Dec. 21 at Travis Avenue Baptist Church in Fort Worth.
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