A decade after her nephew’s 1911 enrollment at Clemson College, Izora Miley joined Cooperative Extension, driving a Model T across unpaved roads to bring household knowledge to rural South Carolina communities and tying her family to Clemson and Cooperative Extension for generations to come.
The blue cotton floral dress hanging in Jo Ann Miley Purkerson’s closet is every bit as stylish today as when she traveled with her aunt, Izora Miley, a retired home demonstration agent, to model it in then Clemson College’s iconic amphitheater nearly 70 years ago.
“Farm and Home Week in 1956 was like a reunion and convention for Extension agents, with both current and former agents attending,” said Jo Ann. “For 4-H students, it was a reward for excelling in our projects.”
Jo Ann had been a district winner in the dress review and was chosen to attend the showcase event. For Jo Ann, it was another stitch in a Clemson thread that had been running through her family for decades, one she would continue by sending her four children to Clemson.
It all began in 1911, when Izora’s brother, John Josiah Miley, and his wife, Minnie, sent their son to Clemson College from the family farm in the small town of Brunson in Hampton County, South Carolina. Three more sons would follow. But while the boys left for Clemson, Izora carried the college back home.
After a decade as a schoolteacher, Izora joined Cooperative Extension in 1921 and served Hampton County for 26 years. At the time, home demonstration work in South Carolina was based at then Winthrop College, the South Carolina College for Women. Clemson College, as the state’s land-grant institution, oversaw the broader Cooperative Extension Service, connecting research and education to communities across the state.
Izora worked to improve the daily lives of farm families by teaching practical skills. Driving a Model T down sandy county roads, she taught food preservation, nutrition, sewing and home management and introduced new technologies such as electricity and refrigeration. With every mile, she delivered the power of the land-grant mission to people who might never set foot on a college campus but deserved the knowledge all the same.
Her passion for learning didn’t stop at the farm gate. Long before Hampton County had a public library, Izora fashioned her car into a bookmobile and encouraged reading wherever she went.
She brought that same dedication to every aspect of her work, though not, admittedly, to the kitchen. “Cooking wasn’t her priority,” said Bill Purkerson ’91, M ’93, M ’00, Izora’s great-nephew and Jo Ann’s son, with a laugh. “She would pick up her sister-in-law, Minnie, to come along and actually do the cooking demonstrations.”
It was one more way Izora got the family involved in Extension, part of the common thread that ties her family — and so many South Carolinians — to Clemson. She brought the land-grant mission to others, one mile, one farm family and one 4-H’er at a time, delivering knowledge where it was needed most.
Today, that work continues. Through Clemson Extension, agents across the state are still meeting people where they are, transforming lives through research and outreach — just as Izora did — ensuring that her spirit of service lives on in every county, every community and every generation.
