Chatham County Extension Homemakers Celebrate 50th Anniversary, 1985

By Mamie Jones in Tar Heel Homemakers, January-March 1986

Chatham County Extension Homemakers celebrated their 50^th anniversary September 21, 1985, on the lawn of the county law enforcement building in Pittsboro.

Dr. Linda McCutcheon, associate state leader, home economics, was guest speaker. She brought smiles to our faces as she reminisced about homemaking in the past and challenged us to share our talents and skills with others for a brighter future.

Other guests included Mrs. Wilma Winstead, president, North Central District Extension Homemakers’ Association, Mrs. Carolyn Register, district program leader; a representative from the board of County Commissioners and agents.

Extension Homemakers worked diligently all spring and summer for this commemorative occasion. A sampler patchwork quilt was made and raffled. Proceeds amounted to approximately $1,500. Tote bags and barbeque aprons were also made and sold at the event, along with hot dogs and baked goods.

Three Extension Homemakers were recognized as 50-year members and presented with 50-year pins. They were Mrs. Jewel Brooks, Hickory Mountain Club; Mrs. Mabel Clark, Silk Hope Club; and Mrs. Clarice Duncan, Silk Hope Club. A plaque listing all County Council presidents from 1935 to present was presented to the past Council Presidents. The plaque will hang in the Extension Office. Mini histories from the 16 EH clubs were printed in the program.

Demonstrations of lye soap, churning, lap quilting and the traditional style of quilting were certainly eye catching to modern day homemakers. A variety of games and contests were enjoyed by all.

We look forward to 50 more years of lifelong learning in Chatham County.

North Carolina's Top Corn Growers in 1949

Yellow metal signs with the above lettering soon will be dotting the rural countryside throughout North Carolina. The signs, 9 1/2 by 12 inches in size, are being awarded to all farmers who have produced a yield of 100 or more bushels of corn on one acre. Dr. E.R. Collins says total membership in the State's 100-Bushel Club reached 1,200 last year and may go beyond the 2,000 mark for 1949. Eligible farmers should see their county agent to obtain the signs, which are being donated by the North Carolina Foundation Seed Producers, Inc.

From Extension Farm-News, January, 1950

E.O. McMahan recently announced the following winners in Scotland County’s three-acre corn and five-acre cotton contest for 1949.

John M. Mclaurin of Laurinburg was declared corn champion with a yield of 132.5 bushels per acre. W.W. Thompson of Laurinburg was second with a yield of 109 bushels, and Fletcher Walters was third with 107.3.

C.S. McArthur of Laurinburg won the cotton contest with a yield of 761 pounds of lint per acre. Gilchrist Brothers of Laurinburg was second with 734 pounds, and Z.V. Pate, Inc., and Will McLeod of Lauren Hill were third with 717 pounds. 

Aline Whittington of Wilkes County 1988 President of NC Extension Homemakers Association

From Tar Heel Homemaker, 1988

Aline (Mrs. Rex) Whittington, a 34-year member of Millers Creek Extension Homemaker Club in Wilkes County, is the 1988 president of North Carolina Extension Homemakers Association. Challenge—Choice—Change has been chosen as her emphasis.

She heads the slate of new officers elected in October at the State Council meeting and installed by Mozelle Parker, chairman of the nominating committee.

As a young mother wanting to learn how to better rear her children and care for her family and home, she joined a Home Demonstration Club. She served in most offices and program of work areas in her club, as president and in other positions in Wilkes County and the Northwestern District through the years.

“Way back when I first joined, I was a youngster and there were many things I needed to learn,” she remembers. “Like making clothes and providing good nutrition for my family. My family has benefitted from my being an Extension Homemaker, and I have gained in many ways personally.”

Aline has been a delegate to several National Conventions and has been on United Nations and University of Wheels trips.

She served on the state committee to set up the Certified Volunteer Unit program; has worked with the county Extension Advisory council and the Northwestern Development Association; has been active in Girl Scout leadership; PTA and other school groups, and has taken numerous leadership positions in Pleasant Home Baptist Church.

She and her husband, who is retired from the Wilkes County School System administration unit and is chairman of the county school board, have four grown children, Sandra Schwartz of Ashe County and Florida, Susan Sander of Garden Valley, Calif., Richard Whittington of Kanohe, Hawaii, and Janice Whittington, who lives next door. They have one grandchild, Brett Whittington of Kahone.

Dwight Williams, Haywood County, Is NC's Champion Corn Grower for 1949

From Extension Farm-News, published January 1950

Dwight Williams, a Haywood County farmer who projected 141 bushels of corn on one acre, has been declared North Carolina’s champion corn grower for 1949, according to Dr. E.R. Collins.

The new champion will receive a $100 bond as regional winner for the mountains and another $100 bond as State winner. Mr. Williams won first place with an acre of Dixie 17 that was seeded May 6 with 12-inch spacing in 42-inch rows. The field was fertilized with two tons of stable manure plus 200 pounds of 7-7-7 at planting and two side dressings of 100 pounds ANL each.

Dale Gainey, 15-year-old Wayne County youth, won the Coastal Plain regional title with a yield of 139.3 bushels. The Piedmont winner was Charlie Barbee of Stanly County, whose yield was 129.2 bushels.

Gainey and Barbee will receive one $100 savings bond each. All of the prizes are donated by the North Carolina Foundation Seed Producers, Inc., and will be presented at the annual meeting of the 100-Bushel Corn Club at State College on January 26 and 27.

More than 500 new members will be inducted into the 100-bushel club at the meeting held jointly with the N.C. Crop Improvement Association and the N.C. Foundation Seed Producers, Inc.

The two-day program will include talks by L.F. Graeber, agronomist of the Wisconsin College of Agriculture; Dr. I.O. Schaub; Dr.R.W. Cummings; and disease, insect, and engineering specialists of the College staff.

Other features of the meeting will be the annual Future Farmers of America crops contest, the 4-H Club corn speaking contest, and the annual State seed exposition.

Raymond Presnell Using Electricity to Heat Bee Hives, 1950

From Extension Farm-News, January, 1950

Raymond Presnell, Watauga County farmer of the Shulls Mills community, is using electrically heated bee hives to winter over small colonies of bees.

Mr. Presnell believes that by wintering small colonies he can save considerable honey that strong colonies would consume.

W.A. Stephen says the electricity will enable the colonies to start brood-rearing and expanding their brood nests early next spring. Thus the small colonies should come through the winter and build up next spring equivalent to colonies going through the winter with much larger populations.

'Personal Mention' of Farmer Work, 1950

'Personal Mention' by F.H. Jeter, Extension Editor, N.C. State College, as published in Extension Farm-News, January 1950

After a long and honorable and successful career, Bob Graeber has decided to call it a day. Bob entered State College in 1907 with total assets of $1.26 in cash and was graduated four years later with high honors. 

That’s been his record since. He has not been afraid of hard work, and his work has borne fruit. Much of his present-day interest in the farm woodlands of North Carolina has been due to his consistent hard-hitting, alert championship of trees. Now he has retired and we wish him luck.

The other day in the little Baptist Church in Oxford, the minister said “Behold in this City is a man of God. He is honorable man.” The preacher quoted from the words of King Saul, who had approached the town in which Samuel, the judge, lived. The words, however, were applied to Gene Moss, who died on December 12. Gene was the father of research with tobacco in North Carolina. More than that, he had studied the practical aspects of tobacco growing and had described them to thousands of visitors who came each summer to Tobacco Branch Station. Gene related his findings in words that could be understood. At the age of 72, worn out with years of hard work and honored by all who knew him, he passed to his reward. His neighbors came in great numbers to pay their final respects and they said simply he had been a servant to them all. A Moss Fellowship is being set up at State College to sponsor research in tobacco, and over $15,000 has been put into the fund up until this time.

Club Leader L.R. Harrill is back from Austria with interesting stories and many kodachrome slides. He believes the 4-H activity set up in Austria will stick and will become a permanent part of that Nation’s agricultural teaching. Mr. Harrill enjoyed many trips over Austria and says it is a beautiful land, rich in culture and history but with the people living too much on past glory. The South tried that for a long time, too. It doesn’t work.

Thanks to Less Schlup and Clara Ackerman for a piece by Bill Humphries in the December issue of the National Extension Review. The story about those Haywood County youngsters making an imprint in Iowa. Believe it or not, lots of people think anyone from the mountains of North Carolina is only a hillbilly, as they are so falsely depicted by some self-appointed interpreters. Perhaps as we sometimes also believe many of the people out there still live in so-thatched hovels while their livestock enjoys the comforts of gaudy, red barns. Both are in the past.

Our congratulations to Iredell’s Roger Murdoch and Wilkes’ Paul Choplin for splendid farm forest contests started in the two counties. Many idle acres in both counties are being reclothed in seedling pine trees.

Congratulations to Doctors Collins and Moore and to F.L. Albritton for 500 new membes in the State 100-bushel corn club, honored at the Crop Improvement meeting here on January 26 and 27. And to Wayne Corpening, again, for the State corn championship going to Dwight Willilams of Haywood. The Junior Championship went to Dale Gainey of Wayne and here, incidentally, is a big hand for Mark Goforth and his associates for that successful corn contest in Wayne for 1949. The celebration down there the other evening was one of the high spots of the 1949 corn year. There were 59 junior and adult farmers winning places in the 100-bushel corn club. This is the outstanding record for any county for the year. Governor Scot has challenged Governor Tuck for another corn “war” in 1950. The North Carolina Governor also intimated that he would like to start a little pasture contest on the side. Governor Tuck said that the corn war was one in which both sides won. It was a great occasion, that luncheon, in the Commonwealth Club at Richmond with Paul Sanders doing the honors and flanked by the two governors. Governor Scott handed over the trophy to the Virginia Executive but warned him about 1950. The luncheon was something to write home about, a fitting climax to a great undertaking.

Our manners to Claude Morgan of Granville. Claude is the new president of the North Carolina Association of County Farm Agents. Assisted by George Hobson of Mecklenburg, first vice-president; Otto Owens of Robeson, second vice-president; Charlie Clark Jr. of Onslow, secretary and treasurer.

A hand also to H.G. Silver, assistant to Virgil H. Holloway, Madison farm agent. Young Silver knows how to write a narrative report. He puts in punch and life as well as information.

E.Y. Floyd tells this editor that Lloyd Weeks is doing a great job of managing the North Carolina Flue-Cured Cooperative Stabilization Corporation. Anyone who can manage an organization with a name like that deserves all the good things that can be said about him.

The Holstein people report great progress. More than 448 new Holstein cows came into North Carolina in 1949, and that noise you hear is the squirming being done by the Guernsey and Jersey people.

Seed of North Carolina’s new disease-resistant tobacco varieties have been in heavy demand. “Let’s hope the new varieties act all right this year,” prays Dr. Bill Colwell, agronomy head. Tobacco, you know, is North Carolina’s fighting crop.

Orchids to Martin’s Tom Brandon and J.W. Sumner for a successful sweet potato contest in 1949 and five boys winning free trips to New York City. Lewis Gurkin of Griffins Township was tops. Thirty-one Martin County boys took part in the sugar spud contest and did creditable work.

Word drifts down from Surry County that Col. Neill Smith is all outfitted in a new suit of clothes to say nothing of other sundries and acceptable gifts donated by a grateful people for constructive work done in Extension last year. And he deserves them everyone.

King Cotton let the growers down last year in Cleveland, Rutherford and Polk counties to such an extent last year that they are included in the four disaster counties for this season, along with Henderson where unreasonable rains ruined things for the truck growers.

Much regret heard at the going of Dr. Roy Lovvorn to head up a division of weed investigations at Washington. Roy is one of the best agronomists in the Nation and his work with pasture crops here in North Carolina helped to get that great forward movement started. We shall miss him.

Don’t overlook Julian Glazener and associates when passing out words of praise. On November 25, Transylvania County became the first county in Western Carolina to meet its responsibilities for a 4-H cabin and for funds to operate the club camp at Waynesville. The cabin was built and completed with volunteer labor on November 8. Everyone had a part.

“Friendly atmosphere and gracious hospitality” is the way home agents tell of their many Christmas parties during the month of December. Wonderful meetings.

Don’t forget that Seth Scott of Pasquotank and Billy Cansler of Iredell won top honors and $200 college scholarships in the Junior Vegetable Growers contest in 1949. Both boys were honored at Washington.

Finally, Bill Hayes of Washington says he stopped vaccinating hogs long enough in December to hold his annual corn growing banquet. Prizes donated by the people of Plymouth ranged all the way form a pair of beautiful wool blankets to a shave, hair cut, shoe shine and free bath at Peoples Barber Shop. Dr. McGowan, local physician, donated a free baby, including the nurse, diaper service, and a little red wagon. The first prize winner, unfortunately, was an old batchelor who declared vehemently he was not interested in the little red wagon.

Retired Agent Tom Broome Talks with Bankers and Farmers, 1950

From Extension Farm-News, January, 1950

T.J.W. Broom, former Union County farm agent, is shown above talking to a group of bankers and farmers during a tour of the Cam T. Cook farm in Union. The visit to the Cook farm was part of the Banker-Farmer Meeting held last fall in which a large number of farms in several counties over the State were visited. Although Mr. Broome retired a few years ago from the county agent post that he held for more than 30 years, he still enjoys taking part in as many activities and farm meetings as possible.