Of my many Methodist deaconess
appointments, I found The Chicago Deaconess Home one of my most
challenging and rewarding. I was third on the staff of those who
cared for twenty retired deaconesses and missionaries. I was the
last active deaconess employed as "Visitor to Hospitalized
Children Receiving Free Care." Monday through Friday I went
to the hospital, helping mostly in pediatrics and with seniors
there who were patients from our two Chicago Methodist Homes.Mealtimes, weekends, and week days, middle afternoon until bedtime, I helped with the care of the residents. Dinner and supper were served around a long white linen-covered table, the administrator and assistant serving as hostesses. I served the food that was carried to some residents, but ate with the group and helped clear and set the table. I assisted at bedtime and other times, taking residents to their doctors’ appointments by taxi. I helped entertain--T.V., radio, story telling, arts and crafts, holiday decorations, residents’ shopping needs, etc. One afternoon a week I served as church secretary in the northwest area of the city, where many youth were on parole. I used keys to enter a high wall gate, church door, and office door. On Friday evenings I helped with play night, checking for guns, knives, and drugs as youth came into the gym.
I served with the children during the polio epidemic, learning to use the "Sister Kenny Method" of heat, warm water, sand bags . . . Other deaconesses and I visited tenements to tell mothers to go to schools and churches where sugar cube prevention clinics were held. These mothers had no newspapers or radios. Although I went into dangerous "city jungles" and areas to the children, youth and seniors, by the "el," subway and bus, rain or shine, summer heat or Chicago wind and winter snow, God kept me safe. The Chicago Home for Deaconesses later became a social orientation shelter for Korean students.