In the early eighties, with the encouragement of her father, she was induced to prove her excellence in domestic science, by displays of her handiwork at the State fairs at Macon and the expositions at Atlanta, Augusta and Columbus. So great was her success that the premiums awarded to her for excellence amounted in the aggregate to nearly ten thousand dollars. So wide was her fame, because of the wonderful work she had done, that her mail became burdened with inquiries for her methods of preparing the various articles in which she seemed so easily to excel.