Belwood Homemakers Club Celebrated 'Annie Warlick Day'

“Cleveland’s Annie Warlick, 90, Began in Tomato Club at 10” by Lois Owen in the April, 1994, issue of Tar Heel Homemakers

The Belwood Extension Homemakers Club of Cleveland County recently saluted a very special member: Mrs. Annie Warlick. As a matter of fact, they called the day “Annie Warlick Day” and held the reception for Annie at Belwood Community Center.

Mrs. Warlick remembers hearing Jane McKimmon speak on July 4, 1914 at a meeting in Rutherford County. Annie was 10 years old at the time and was impressed with what Miss McKimmon said. Annie also preferred to work outside on the farm with her father, rather than the more traditional female jobs inside the home, so she became a member of Elliott’s Church Tomato Club, clubs which later became Home Demonstration Clubs and are today’s Extension Homemakers Clubs. Miss McKimmon was the state advisor for the Tomato Clubs.

Annie’s father helped her to prepare the land and soon she was involved in her first gardening project. This early experience in gardening and record keeping taught responsibility. She was disappointed, however, when the garden was disqualified from the competition because it was a “little more than a tenth of an acre,” which was the amount specified.

Mrs. Annie was recently featured in a local newspaper article. She told about the first home economics agent in the county, Miss Susan Weathers. Her means of transportation was a horse and buggy. Extension Homemaker members learned many things through the years about family living, food preparation, home furnishings, food safety, and other topics. Miss Thelma McVea, retired home economics Extension agent, taught the members how to use the pressure canner to preserve foods. Mrs. Warlick has a story to tell about the first time she canned jelly for a club competition. She and a friend poured the beautiful hot jelly into the jars and then dipped them into a pot of cold water. (The jars broke.) This was a lesson the girls learned the hard way! Mrs. Warlick’s mother was president of the Warlick Extension Homemakers Club when she married into the family and into the club.

Mrs. Warlick’s family has been active in the North Carolina Cooperative Extension Service. All five of their children were members of 4-H. One daughter, Mrs. Ostine West, retired as home economics Extension agent in Davie County. One daughter-in-law, Mrs. Marlie Dean Warlick, is a former county council president.

Mrs. Warlick began in 1914 as a member of Elliotts Church Tomato Club. She became a member of Warlick Extension Homemakers Club, which later changed the name to Belwood Extension Homemakers Club. She has almost 80 years of active membership. Active membership means she still prepares and serves lunch to the entire club each year. That is quite a record and Mrs. Annie Warlick is quite a lady!