Luella Smith was a professor at Bethel College, and the leader of a ‘CO Girls’ unit in 1945. The unit was placed at a mental health hospital in Cleveland, Ohio. When the CO Girls arrived at the ward on their first day it was suppertime, and they saw that patients had to eat with their fingers. Luella Smith went to the doctor in charge and requested (insisted!) that spoons be given to the patients at meals, and that her CO Girls would be in charge of collecting and counting the spoons after each meal. The following day, spoons appeared at meals.
Story told to Lisa Weaver by her great-aunt Gladys Graber Beyler, who was one of the CO Girls in Luella Smith’s unit. An article about CO Units in mental health hospitals (including the CO Girls units) can be found in Eastern Mennonite University’s Crossroads publication (Vol 92, No. 1/2, pages 2-12). It states in that article that the CO Girls developed guidelines for themselves, one of which was: “Speak a greeting to anyone, everyone on the hospital campus, in the corridors, on the wards, in the cafeteria.”
Submitted by Lisa Weaver
