NCWC Receives Gift for Scholarships

Rocky Mount, N.C.—A recent gift of $332,000 to North Carolina Wesleyan College from the estate of Anita Bobbitt, a lifelong resident of the Rocky Mount area, will increase Wesleyan’s scholarship funds for students from North Carolina while it honors the memory of Mrs. Bobbitt’s parents.

Anita Bobbitt, who grew up as an only child on her parents’ farm in Edgecombe County, died in February 2008. She established the John C. and Huldah B. Daughtridge Scholarship Fund at Wesleyan in 1998. College records show that she said at the time, “I think a lot of this college. I always have from the very beginning…. Although Daddy attended State and Mother graduated from ECU, North Carolina Wesleyan was always a favorite of theirs. I remember my mother always talking about the college.

“When Father died in 1960, we asked for memorials to the college in lieu of flowers. It was a positive thing in their life. Daddy was a farmer; Mother taught school for 15 years. After he died, she ran the farm until she was 85. My mother died in January and was 100.”

Mrs. Bobbitt worked at People’s Bank from 1939 until 1980, “back when everybody who worked together were one big family, and you knew each other’s children’s names, and grandchildren’s names, and all about them,” she said.

Malcolm M. Woodall, Wesleyan’s vice president of development, said Wesleyan is grateful to Mrs. Bobbitt for her planning and generosity. “The Daughtridge Scholarship Fund has already helped many students with financial need to graduate from Wesleyan since 1998. This recent estate gift will significantly increase the aid that Wesleyan can offer deserving students, as financial earnings from the fund accrue. Very importantly, Mrs. Bobbitt’s estate gift will establish a wonderful legacy that will perpetuate and honor the memory of her parents, which was her unselfish wish.”

Mrs. Bobbitt was a long-time member of Rocky Mount’s First Presbyterian Church. She volunteered to help with the early Day for Wesleyan fundraisers. Her husband, James M.S. Bobbitt, ran Bobbitt Hobby Shop in Rocky Mount. He died in 1993 at age 82.