MARGERY REED MAYO DAY NURSERY RECORDS

In 1898, Mrs. Johanna Breusch started a day care service in her home at 1929 Wewatta Street near the Union Station in Denver, Colorado. She opened the service for children of working or ill mothers. Her only compensation was contributions of food for the children and small donations of money. Mrs. Breusch closed the day care service in 1906. At the time, she was caring for seventeen children in addition to twelve of her own. A group of interested women reopened the nursery in a rented six room house at 2746 Lawrence Street. Mrs. Thomas F. Daly organized the day care center in 1906, with the assistance of several other women. They managed to stay open despite a scarcity of funds. In 1910, they asked working mothers to pay five cents a day and opened a rummage shop to help defray expenses. Many Denver society matrons contributed clothing and other articles. Mrs. T.F. Patterson became the shop's proprietress, while debutantes, Miss Helen Bonfils, Miss Margery Reed, Miss Imogene Daly and many others, became the salesladies. On September 27, 1911, the nursery was incorporated as a non-profit, benevolent, educational institution under the name The Social Center and Day Nursery Association.

In 1914, during World War I, the nursery closed its doors because its supporters became involved in war service. The nursery resumed in 1915 with a new Board of Directors. Miss Helen Bonfils and Miss Margery Reed were faithful supporters of the new board. They continued until the early twenties when Mrs. Ira Rothgerber and Mrs. Thomas A. Cosgriff joined them.

Mrs. Verner Z. (Mary D.) Reed provided the funding for the Margery Reed Mayo Day Nursery, built in 1926 as a memorial to her daughter, Margery Reed Mayo, who died in 1925. Children of all religious beliefs and of different nationalities received not only physical care, but also a well-planned program for the optimum development of each child. It included periods of free play, supervised activities, rest, music and a balanced diet, as well as arts, crafts and entertainment.

On January 3, 1944, the Sisters of Charity of Cincinnati, Ohio, were given possession of the building. Mrs. Reed intended to erect a Convent and Chapel for the Sisters on the lots adjoining the Nursery, but her untimely death interrupted the plan.

Expansion of the Margery Reed Mayo Day Nursery made it necessary to acquire any available ground near or adjacent to the building. The Housing Commission of the Curtis Park Housing Project generously deleted Lots 31 and 32, Block 46, in the Case and Ebert’s Addition from their plans and placed an option on the Lots for three months in favor of the Nursery. Due to a lack of funds, on July 15, 1952, the option expired, so the property reverted back to private ownership. Friends of the Nursery rallied to the cause and development of improvements began. Many friends of the children contributed funds and equipment to the expansion of a playground for the tots, called The Tots' Lot.

The Nursery is not an endowed institution, but benefits from the interest of dividends from the Reed Trust Fund. Mrs. Reed established the trust to maintain the Nursery until such time as it might become self-sustaining. This dividend, combined with the small fee charged for the care of children, represented the only income for operation of the Nursery until it was accepted by the Mile High United Fund in the 1950s.