Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: THURSDAY, October 28, 1993 TAG: 9310280447
SECTION: NEIGHBORS PAGE: S-10 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: BETSY BIESENBACH STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
The council honored her for 50 years of membership, but Dudley actually has been attending meetings for far longer. Her mother was a member, Dudley said, and started taking her to meetings soon after Dudley was born.
Dudley received a certificate from Gov. Douglas Wilder during Extension Homemakers Week in Virginia, the week of Oct. 10.
Jean Vandergrift, an economist with the Cooperative Extension Service, said the nationwide organization was begun in Virginia in 1914. The service is a branch of the state's land-grant institutions, including Virginia Tech, and is sponsored by local, state and federal funds.
While the service's agricultural agents went into the fields with the farmers to teach them how to raise better crops, the home economists met with the farm women to discuss household management and better methods of cooking and preserving food.
Dudley has saved materials and publications from the Extension Service that date back to World War II. The topics include subjects such as the best way to iron a shirt and how to care for chickens.
Both the service and the clubs "sort of evolved together," Vandergrift said, when the women in various neighborhoods began to organize themselves.
At one time, Dudley said, there were 32 clubs in the Roanoke Valley Council. Now there are only 15.
Although most people no longer live on farms, the Extension Service is "busier than ever," Vandergrift said. All of its programs, including those offered to the homemakers clubs, are open to the public and include topics such as financial management, exercise, home security, dealing with household hazardous waste and the proper use of pesticides.
Dudley agreed that the topics have changed in the past 50 years. "There used to be more crafts and cooking," she said.
Dudley was born and reared in the Williamson Road area, spending her first 16 years at her grandparents' home near the intersection of Williamson Road and Orange Avenue. At that time, there was enough room to keep chickens, pigs and cows on the property, she said.
In 1943, when Dudley was 19, she joined her mother's group, the Oakland Extension Homemakers Club, which is no longer in existence. In 1956, she and her husband, Nelson, moved to the Crescent Heights neighborhood of Roanoke County, where they reared their five children.
She joined the club there and has been its president "off and on" for 16 of the past 36 years, including this year.
The club meets once a month on Wednesday mornings in members' homes. The program usually begins with a demonstration in crafts, cooking or nutrition and ends with a meal. Sometimes, Dudley said with a laugh, the meetings last until 1 or 2 p.m., "depending on how much we get to talking."
The group pays dues to the council; but for their own dues, the yearly cost is a penny per year of a member's life. Often the group will raffle off a small item among themselves for a few dollars, and they hold a "white elephant" sale once a year.
Members pay all of their own expenses for project materials, so all of the money raised at meetings goes toward charitable causes. Some is used to send a child to 4-H camp; the rest goes to a yearly carnival for patients at the Veterans Administration Medical Center.
Otherwise, Dudley said, "if we see somebody that needs something, we do it."
Another popular activity for club members is entering craft and cooking contests. Dudley has won so many awards, she has lost track of them. One she is especially proud of was for a recipe for a sour cream cake she invented.
At the height of the group's membership, there were 35 women on its rolls. Because most young women work these days, Dudley said, there have been no new members in a long while. In fact, although Dudley has been in the organization longer than any other member of her club, she is the youngest in the group.
Today, because of deaths and illnesses, the membership has declined. But the women still have a good time together, Dudley said, and would probably continue to socialize even if there was no club.
"It's just good fellowship," she said. "I've learned a lot from the club."
The extension service also recognized women who have 30 and 40 years of membership.
Dollie Garman of Blacksburg Road, Doris Shelor of Blacksburg Road, Elva Sirry of Newport Road, Nell Ulrey of Elva Road, and Josephine Williams of McDivitt Road have been members for 40 years.
Annie B. Brock of Fontaine Drive, Margaret F. Miller of Shelor Lane, and Connie B. Shelor of Gravel Hill Road have been members for 30 years.
by CNB