NCSU Libraries Focus Online

Volume 22 number 3 - Spring 2002

By June Brotherton, Administration and Advancement

Eloise S. Cofer has always been a groundbreaker who set the pace for those who followed behind her. Early in her career as a teacher and nutritionist, she discovered the impact of education in empowering poor and disadvantaged people to help themselves, working as an extension specialist with the West Virginia Extension Service.

She discovered the power of government in helping those who often cannot help themselves. Working for the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) in the late 1950s, Cofer was involved in the war on poverty and malnutrition in rural and urban areas. Finally, working with the North Carolina Extension Service (now called the North Carolina Cooperative Extension Service), she discovered the power of leadership education in enabling women to become agents for change in their communities. Her work was influenced by and enmeshed with many issues of the time, such as desegregation, women's emergence as leaders of industry and government, and the involvement of women in mainstream political action.

While her work proved hard, because it was on the leading edge, Cofer never regretted a day of it. "I never went to work that I wasn't glad I was there," she states.

A West Virginia native and 1937 graduate of Marshall University, she received her master's degree in nutrition from Columbia University Teachers College. After graduation, Cofer taught at Stephens College for several years and joined the staff of the West Virginia University (WVU) Extension Service, working in rural nutrition education programs for twelve years and completing a doctorate at the University of Chicago.

Armed with her Ph.D., she worked for the USDA's Agricultural Research Service, planning food budgets based on four income levels determined by Bureau of Labor statistics information and by research on food purchasing and consumption habits of Americans. These budgets helped to determine the amounts of food assistance that state and local social services departments would provide to needy families on welfare to ensure basic, adequate nutrition.

During that same period, George A. Hyatt, a colleague on the WVU extension staff, left to work for the North Carolina Cooperative Extension Service, later heading that organization. As head, he recruited Cofer in 1963 to work at NC State as assistant director for home economics, a position first held by Jane S. McKimmon. The job involved long hours and frequent travel across the state. Cofer supervised the home economics programs and the specialists who worked across the state with county agents on issues ranging from food, nutrition, and clothing to family development and consumer science. She remains proud of her work to increase the professionalism and applied research orientation of her staff, noting,

"I emphasized the professional development and education of specialists and district agents who worked with agents in program development. At the time I joined the Cooperative Extension Service, the home economics specialists did not get the respect they deserved because they did not have advanced educations, so we worked hard to get them back in school, earning masters' and doctorate degrees."

Her greatest challenge came in the early 1970s with the desegregation of the Cooperative Extension Service. On this subject, as with most others, Cofer is matter-of-fact. When asked how it was accomplished, she said,

"We worked with the specialists at North Carolina A&T State University, most specifically Dr. Minnie Brown, and integrated our own staffs first. Then working together, serving as role models, we went to all of the Extension Homemaker Clubs across the state and laid out our plan for integration of these tight-knit community organizations. Because of the work of extension personnel like Dr. Brown, who led by example, and Ada Della Poza from the N.C. Extension Service, who ensured that all new agents hired shared the same philosophy, the clubs survived the transition and became even stronger in the late '70s and '80s. It really happened quite smoothly, more smoothly than we expected."

Continued emphasis on and programs in leadership development for women, a legacy of former extension home economics heads McKimmon and Ruth Current, provided the key to the survival of Extension Homemaker Clubs during desegregation. States Cofer,

"As women learned about leadership, they became more confident that they could provide successful leadership for positive change in their communities. Over time, we saw numbers of women--African American and white--who had come through extension leadership programs either running for and winning local offices or becoming a vocal and important part of their communities' leadership process."

This leadership extended into the halls of the North Carolina General Assembly. For years, the Extension Homemakers had wanted to construct a facility in Raleigh to conduct statewide meetings and offer educational programs. They had accumulated $100,000 toward this goal when the concept arose of building a continuing education center on NC State's campus. Extension Homemaker Clubs across the state decided to support legislation to fund this new facility and to provide their $100,000 as seed money for the project. Extension Homemakers from Manteo to Murphy spent innumerable hours educating their local legislators about the benefits to North Carolinians of a continuing education facility at NC State. The legislation passed, and in 1976 the new continuing education center was named in tribute to the first leader of family and consumer sciences in the extension service, Jane S. McKimmon. Also honored were the Extension Homemakers who made the facility a reality through their legislative efforts. Room 4 of McKimmon Center was dedicated to them and today contains historical memorabilia from McKimmon and Current, other extension staff members, and Extension Homemaker Clubs across the state.

Cofer retired in 1980 after a rewarding career at NC State, but she did not stop spurring others to achievement and action. She reemphasized her fundamental belief in the power of education when, in 2001, she created an endowment at NC State. Called the Eloise S. Cofer Endowment, it will provide unrestricted funds to benefit four educational entities: the NCSU Libraries, Arts NC State, the J. C. Raulston Arboretum, and the NC Cooperative Extension Service Foundation.

Asked why she chose the NCSU Libraries as a beneficiary of her endowment, Cofer's response was simple:

"Libraries are special. You can't have a good university without a good library. Libraries are basic to everything in education. Philosophically, I think libraries are the foundation of education. Maintaining the level of resources that research libraries like NC State's have just doesn't stop, so continuing support is critical."