Rebekah Warlick Cilley (born Rowe)
Personal
Gender: Female
Date of Death: October 30, 2005
Death Place: Conover, NC
Rebekah Warlick Rowe Cilley
CONOVER — Mrs. Cilley, of Conover, a member of prominent Catawba County families whose career took her to distinguished positions both nearby and across the world from her native Newton, died Sunday following several weeks of illness.
Mrs. Cilley, whose immediate family included two mayors of Newton, Eli Alexander Warlick, the city’s fourth mayor (1867-69) and George Andrew Warlick (1913-18), returned to her native county a quarter century ago and pursued her zeal for historic preservation with her husband, who was a member of a prominent Hickory clan.
A memorial service for Mrs. Cilley, who died at Palliative Care Center and Hospice of Catawba Valley, will be conducted Wednesday at 1 p.m. at Newton First Presbyterian Church Chapel (old sanctuary). Officiating will be the Rev. Dr. John Skelly, interim pastor of the church. The family will receive friends in the church parlor immediately following the service. Burial in Eastview Cemetery in Newton will be private.
She was a daughter of the late Winnie Warlick and Clyde Fulton Rowe, a seventh generation descendant of the two Newton area families. Her grandparents were Mr. and Mrs. Daniel Lafayette Rowe and George Andrew Warlick and his wife, Lillie Gill Warlick; in 1970 she was married to Hickory native Donald Adoolphus Cilley.
Following graduation from the former Newton High school she was educated at Virginia Intermont College in Bristol, VA, where she was president of Phi Rho Pi, Alpha Chapter, National Forensic Society, receiving the diamond key pin in debating. She was a member of the women’s college’s Glee Club and violinist in the college string ensemble.
In her youth she was the Charlotte Observer’s, ‘Carolinas Career Girl of the Month.’ In 1949 she went to Tokyo, Japan to become the civilian executive assistant to Major General Edwin K. Wright, who was General Douglas MacArthur’s G-3 (chief of operations) while MacArthur was Supreme Commander for the Allied Powers in Japan following World War II. She had a Top Secret clearance and worked with MacArthur’s General Staff on the operations of the Korean War.
Later the then-Miss Rowe became executive assistant to Dr. John R. Cunningham, president of Davidson College. In the 1970s, while residing in Raleigh with her husband, she was assistant to Senator James D. Speed of Louisburg (Franklin County) in the Senate of the North Carolina General Assembly.
With a life-long interest in local history, Mrs. Cilley and her husband were benefactors of the Catawba County Museum of History. She was a member of the John Hoyle Chapter, Daughters of the American Revolution and Ransom-Sherrill Chapter, United Daughters of the Confederacy, and the Catawba County Historical Association.
She was a charter member and former president of the Bas Bleu Club, a Newton women’s civic-service organization, Conover Service League, Town and Country Bridge Club, Catawba Country Club and Western North Carolina Ladies Golf Association.
A supporter of education, she established the Roy C. Brown Forensic Scholarship at Virginia Intermont College and history awards at Newton-Conover High school and Newton-Conover Middle School.
Mrs. Cilley was a long-time member of the Episcopal Church of the Ascension in Hickory and more recently a member of the First Presbyterian Church in Newton.
In addition to her parents, she was preceded in death by her husband, a sister, Shirley Gill Rowe, and a nephew, Eugene Fielding Clark II.
She is survived by a sister, Mrs. E. Fielding (Clydie Rowe) Clark of Conover; a nephew, George Warlick Clark, and wife, Barbara, of Iron Station; two grandnieces, Bonnie Jaan Clark and Amanda Carson Clark; two grandnephews, E. Fielding (Beau) Clark III and George Warlick Clark II; and a niece-in-law, Barbara M. Clark of Conover.
Anyone wishing may send a memorial to the Catawba County Historical Association, Post Office Box 73, Newton, NC 28658; Humane Society of Catawba County, Post Office Box 63, Hickory, NC 28603; or the E. Fielding Clark II Scholarship, established at Newton-Conover High School following his death in 2002, at N-C City Schools, 605 North Ashe Avenue, Newton, NC 28658.
Willis-Reynolds Funeral Home and Crematory of Newton is in charge of funeral arrangements.
Published in the Charlotte Observer on October 31, 2005
