Twenty-nine...and holding!

By Carrie D. Worthington, Publications Officer

If you total her years of employment in various positions since college - elementary school teacher in Virginia, elementary, high school and substitute teacher in North Carolina, and Applications Specialist at the North Carolina Real Estate Commission - you get well over 30 years. But for Gloria Williams, the Commission's senior employee, it's 29 and holding! She isn't even thinking about retiring.

"I like my job," she said emphatically. And she must like it. She's worked with the Commission for almost 26 years - since the fall of 1971!

She laughed when she talked about her pre-employment interview with then Executive Director Joseph Schweidler.

"One of the things he asked me to spell was 'prosperity,"' she smiled. "I spelled it! I'm a good speller," said the former school teacher.

But Mrs. Williams' smile quickly faded when she remembered Mr. Schweidler's untimely death, and that of another former Executive Director, Blanton Little, as well as other staff and Commission members with whom she worked throughout the years.

"I've enjoyed working with the people here," she said wistfully.

When Mrs. Williams joined the Commission staff, the office was in downtown Raleigh in the BB&T Building. She compared the staff at that time to "what we have now. Back then, we had only two men and three women," she stated.

What we have now is a staff of 47, and a Commission with seven members instead of five. [The membership of the North Carolina Real Estate Licensing Board was increased from five to seven members by the 1979 Session of the General Assembly. By further legislative action in 1983, the name of the Licensing Board was changed to the North Carolina Real Estate Commission. (See Commission history article starting on page I of this Anniversary Supplement.)]

"It's interesting seeing things change, how we've grown," Mrs. Williams said. "Of course, we didn't have computers," she continued. "We had to type or write out everything. We were self-sustaining. I was my own department - taking care of applications, doing my own letters."

Mrs. Williams still takes care of applications, and the applicants who send them. As Senior Applications Specialist, in addition to reviewing and processing all applications for salesman and broker licenses, she schedules applicants for examination and handles inquiries regarding applicant qualifications.

Much of her time is spent on the telephone, addressing topics that range from applicants' concerns about meeting the examination-filing deadline, to questions about required documentation. And she answers all questions - both big and small - with the same patience and professionalism that has gained her the respect of her coworkers a-s well as licensees throughout the years. She is proud of her part in helping future licensees enter the real estate industry.

Mrs. Williams explained that when she joined the staff, there were only two real estate examination centers in North Carolina - one in Winston-Salem and one in Raleigh. Now the examination is given in eight cities throughout the state.

"We used to go and administer it. Mr. Little would give the instructions," Mrs. Williams reminisced. "We hire people [independent contractors] to do it now," she added.

"I forgot what year it was, but one month we had so many people - over 2,000 - we had to give the exam three or four days," she said.

 That year was probably 1979, when qualification requirements to sit for the broker exam increased from 30 to 60 classroom hours of instruction (or from 12 to 24 months' full-time experience as a licensed salesman). But Mrs. Williams remembers when some applicants qualified for licensure without examination.

"I had a file, and if a person called in, I checked it to see if they had a privilege license to sell real estate in 1957 [the year the Commission was founded]." If so, "we would issue them a license, under the Grandfather Clause, without having them sit for the exam."

Mrs. Williams remembers the Commission's move from the BB&T Building to the Brown-Rogers Building on Hillsborough Street, from there to 1200 Navaho Drive, and finally to our present address, 1313 Navaho.

She also remembers when we got our first computers, and lists that as one of the biggest changes she has seen since she has been employed by the Commission.

"It was a good change," she stated. "We can do more now, do things faster."

Mrs. Williams plans to be here to see additional changes in the future. She doesn't have any plans to retire.

"I'm not going to retire, to sit around and do nothing," she stated. "I enjoy working here - really," she exclaimed, as if, after 25+ years, anyone would doubt it!