[Congressional Record Volume 142, Number 110 (Wednesday, July 24, 1996)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Page E1363]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                      TRIBUTE TO SELMA JEAN COHEN

                                 ______
                                 

                        HON. BENJAMIN L. CARDIN

                              of maryland

                    in the house of representatives

                        Wednesday, July 24, 1996

  Mr. CARDIN. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to pay tribute to the life of 
Selma Jean Cohen, a Baltimorean who recently died after dedicating much 
of her life to helping others.
  Mrs. Cohen, who died July 2 at the age of 75, was born in an era that 
did not encourage women to develop all their talents. But that did not 
stop her from marching to her own drummer and taking on new challenges. 
As a mother, wife, volunteer and professional woman, she found 
innumerable ways throughout her life to make a difference in her 
community and in the lives of hundreds of families she befriended in 
times of need.
  In her early years of raising her two sons, Ellis and Jerome, Mrs. 
Cohen was a PTA president, a Cub Scout den mother and the president of 
the sisterhood at her synagogue. After her sons were grown, Mrs. Cohen 
began a career at the State department of health and mental hygiene 
where she became the director of nursing home bed registry, a position 
she held for 25 of her 34 years with the department.
  But her work with the State was just part of her dedication to 
helping others. Mrs. Cohen and her husband, Leonard, whom she met at a 
Benny Goodman dance in 1940, have been weekend volunteers at the Ronald 
McDonald House in Baltimore for the past 10 years. In their work at the 
Ronald McDonald House, they comforted out-of-town families with very 
sick children at Baltimore area hospitals and made these families feel 
at home. She and Leonard also found time to do hospice work at 
Levindale Hebrew Geriatric Center and Hospital and help sick children 
at the Mount Washington Pediatric Hospital.
  I urge my colleagues to join me in extending our condolences to the 
family of Selma Jean Cohen. Her cheer and energy will be missed by all 
who knew her and by all of us who believe that one person can make a 
difference.

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