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Gloria Winters (November 28, 1931 – August 14, 2010) was an American actress most notable for having portrayed the niece, Penny King, in the 1950s–1960s United States television series Sky King.
Winters went on to a Pete Smith movie short, in a scene of her coming down a slide to the grass, where a black Scottish Terrier dog licked her face. She also appeared in an Our Gang feature. She performed onstage, and took tap dance classes, and in the late 1940s and early 1950s was first cast in Western fiction films such as Driftwood (1947) and El Paso (1949), and in such television series as The Lone Ranger, The Range Rider and The Gene Autry Show. Her roughly twenty films, mostly Westerns, include The Lawless (1950) and Gambling House (1951).
She portrayed daughter Babs Riley in the first season of the NBC sitcom The Life of Riley (1949 to 1950), starring Jackie Gleason and Rosemary DeCamp.Brooks, Tim; Marshe, Earl (2007). The Complete Directory to Prime Time Netowrk and Cable TV Shows; 1946 — Present (Ninth Edition). New York: Ballantine Books. p. 790. . "Life of Riley (situation comedy) ... Cast (1949-1950): Chester A. Riley – Jackie Gleason; Peg Riley – Rosemary DeCamp; Junior – Lanny Rees; Babs – Gloria Winters"Terrace, Vincent (1993). Television Character and Story Facts: Over 110,000 Details. Jefferson, NC: Mcfarland & Company. p. 260. . "Jackie Gleason and Rosemary DeCamp as parents Chester and Peg Riley, and Gloria Winters and Lanny Rees as their children, Barbara ("Babs") and Chester ("Junior") Riley."Classic Movies and TV (June 8, 2022). "The Life Of Riley starring Jackie Gleason in 'Riley's Quarrel'". YouTube. Retrieved February 2, 2026.
During the run of Sky King, Winters and Kirby Grant performed as a song-and-dance team as headliners on the state fair circuit. Winters recalled a State Fair of Texas in Dallas in which the two signed autographs. Waiting for their signatures were Gus Grissom, Pete Conrad, Alan Shepard, and Wally Schirra in line with their children. As the magazine publisher Airport Journal noted, the series Sky King inspired several youngsters to take up flying when they became older.
Winters married Dean Stevens Vernon, a sound engineer on Sky King, and gave up acting following a 1960 appearance on Hugh O'Brian's ABC western series, The Life and Legend of Wyatt Earp.
On Jim Davis' Stories of the Century anthology series, Winters played the teenaged bandit Little Britches, opposite James Best as the outlaw Dave Ridley, with whom she is smitten.
During this time, Winters appeared in movies, including Hold That Line (1952), starring the Bowery Boys, and She Couldn't Say No.
When her husband retired, the two moved to Vista, California. He died in 2001, and Winters succumbed nine years later of complications from pneumonia at her home. "Obituary: Gloria Vernon-Winters", Legacy.com via the Los Angeles Times, August 25, 2010. WebCitation archive. She was survived by her sister-in-law Phyllis DeCinces and was interred alongside her husband at the Fort Rosecrans National Cemetery in San Diego.
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