TIFTON — Lutrelle Tift “Weetie” Rankin, 90, of Tifton, died peacefully Thursday, Feb. 4, 2010, at her residence, surrounded by family.

Memorial services will be held at 4 p.m. Sunday at St. Anne’s Episcopal Church, with the Rev. Lonnie Lacy officiating.

The family will receive friends from 3 p.m. Sunday until the time of services at St. Anne’s parish hall.

In lieu of flowers, donations may be made to Hospice of Tift Area or to St. Anne’s Episcopal Church.

Born April 15, 1919, in Tifton, Mrs. Rankin was the daughter of Amos Chapman Tift Jr. and Lutrelle McLennan Tift, both deceased. She was the granddaughter of Tifton’s founder, Henry Harding Tift.

In addition to her parents, she was also preceded in death by her husband, Homer M. Rankin, who died in 1995, and by an infant son, Homer M. Rankin III.

Mrs. Rankin was educated in the Tifton public schools and received an ABA in journalism from the University of Georgia. An article which she wrote on the Tifton Tobacco Market was published nationwide when she was 14 years old.

During her summers while in journalism school and after graduation she edited her own weekly newspaper, The Star, in St. Simons, Sea Island and Brunswick.

During World War II, Mrs. Rankin served with the Women’s Auxiliary Enlistment Service (WAVES) of the U.S. Navy, attaining the rank of full lieutenant after graduating from officers’ training school in Northampton, Mass. During her service, she worked under Secretary of the Navy Frank Knox in Washington, D.C.; was on the staff of Chief of Naval Operations Admiral Ernest J. King; and was editor of the Anti-Submarine Warfare Bulletin. Later, she became editor of the Brooklyn Navy Yard “Shipworker,” a weekly with a circulation of more than 70,000.

She and her husband, Homer Rankin, were married Aug. 20, 1944, in New York City, at the “Little Church Around the Corner.” The Rankins were owners of The Tifton Gazette for 29 years, from 1952 until it was sold to Thomson Newspapers in 1981. 

Mrs. Rankin was managing editor of The Gazette and was the winner of numerous Georgia Press Association awards for editorials. She wrote columns for the Sunday Macon Telegraph, The Gazette and the University of Georgia’s Red and Black. She was the state winner for an editorial on “Brotherhood,” sponsored by the National Association of Christians and Jews.

Mrs. Rankin was a member of St. Anne’s Episcopal Church, where she taught Sunday school for 13 years and served on the Altar Guild and the Church Building committee. She was chairman of the Tift County Recreation Board and was a charter member of Camellia Garden Club. She served on PTA boards at several local schools and was chairman of the Junior Woman’s Club annual Tobacco Ball.

She is survived by three daughters, Lutrelle Tift Rankin II, Anne Lebby Rankin and Lyn Rankin Pate, all of Tifton; five sons and five daughters-in-law, Royal Forbes Rankin and Debra Connor Rankin, Thomas Lebby Rankin and Susan Whittington Rankin and Shine Fleetwood Rankin Sr. and Florence Ridgdill Rankin, all of Tifton, Meade McLennan Rankin and Krystal Raines Rankin of Stewart, Fla., and John Duncan Rankin and Karen McDaniel Rankin of Seale, Ala.; 18 grandchildren, Joel Edward Quinn, James Anthony Quinn, Connor Tift Rankin, Elsa Caroline Rankin, Marti W. Watt, Emily M. Hoffman, Cameron L. Duncan,  Allison Nicole Pate, Jonathan Hunter Pate, Daniel Meade Rankin, Nicole Kristen Rankin, Elizabeth Rankin Milner, Shine Fleetwood Rankin Jr., John Stewart Rankin, Drew Gregory Rankin, Homer Meade Rankin IV, Kinsey Lutrelle Rankin and Thomas Lebby Rankin II; and eight great-grandchildren, Joel Edward Quinn III, William Anthony Quinn, David Connor Rankin, Madison Leigh Watt, Selah Anne Hoffman, John Bradley Milner, Henry Tift Milner and Cayden Bailey Rankin.

Bowen-Donaldson Home for Funerals is in charge of arrangements.