[4] Bates was born Gladys Cecelia Edgerly on July 15, 1896, in Hopewell, New Jersey.

[1] From 1910 to 1916 she attended the Corcoran School of Art in Washington, D.C.[2] In 1916 she began attending the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Art (PAFA) where she studied with Daniel Garber and Charles Grafly.

There they were among the artists who worked with Charles Harold Davis to establish the Mystic Museum of Art.

[6] Bates was a member of the Philadelphia Ten, the Mystic Art Association, the National Association of Women Artists and the National Sculpture Society.

[2] Bates died in Mystic, Connecticut on July 28, 2003.