Mary Ellen Crawford Ames
Week of December 4, 2000

As director of personnel and as director of admissions, Mary Ellen Crawford Ames, class of 1940, has served -- and continues to serve –Wellesley College in a variety of ways.

Mary Ellen Crawford, a graduate of Thayer Academy, came to Wellesley College in 1936. At Wellesley she lived in a cooperative dormitory – where the students did housekeeping chores in exchange for a reduction in their tuition, room, and board. Crawford majored in history and played an active role in a number of clubs and organizations (Cosmopolitan Club, Christian Association, and the Scout Club). She served as business manager of Legenda and participated in a number of sports.

After graduating from Wellesley College in 1940, Mary Ellen Crawford took a three-month secretarial course in Cambridge, Mass. In 1943 she joined the war effort. Crawford was secretary to the American Red Cross unit that was attached to the First General Hospital, serving in Fort Meade, Md. and Camp Pickett, Va. Her unit was in London during the Blitz and landed on Omaha Beach shortly after D-Day. She later said, "I've looked for the best in people ever since, because I know it's there."

In 1946 Wellesley President Mildred McAfee Horton persuaded Mary Ellen Crawford to return to Wellesley College to direct the personnel office. Crawford had responsibility for employment of all College workers who were not faculty or senior administrators and served as the College's representative in negotiations with the relatively new maintenance and service workers union. To broaden her knowledge, she took courses in personnel, labor relations, and statistics at Radcliffe, New York University, and Northeastern University.

In 1952 Mary Ellen Crawford married George H. Ames, an insurance broker. Two years later she left Wellesley to devote herself to being a wife and mother.

While at home, Ames served as an admissions interviewer for Wellesley College. In December 1964 she returned to the College to work in the Office of Admission. From 1969 until she retired in 1985 Mary Ellen Ames was the director of admission. At that time, Wellesley had just begun to actively recruit students and to market itself to a broad spectrum of potential applicants. She revised the board of admissions, adding faculty and student members to the group that read applications. Under Ames' leadership, Wellesley College began the early evaluation of applicants and instituted a need-blind admission policy which ensured that applicants were evaluated on the basis of their talents and personal qualities, not on their ability to pay. Open Campus Days were begun to bring potential students to Wellesley to learn more about the College.

When Ames retired, the Wellesley College Alumnae Association established the Mary Ellen Crawford Ames '40 Scholarship Fund.

Ames was a national leader in the admissions field. She served as a trustee of the College Entrance Examination Board from 1973 to 1977. The following year she was chosen to be one of a committee of eight to work with the Educational Testing Service to develop the SAT. She served on the National Merit Scholarship Selection Committee, the National Hispanic Achievement Scholars Advisory Committee, the first nationwide scholarship for disadvantaged students (sponsored by Coca-Cola), and on the review committee for Presidential Scholars.

Mary Ellen Ames's life has not been defined solely by her professional work. During the summers of 1949 and 1950 she led a group of college women to France and Denmark as part of the Experiment in International Living. She was a leader in the Natick (Mass.) League of Women Voters and a director of the Family Counseling Service, Region West. For nearly a decade she served as a trustee of Thayer Academy. She was the first recipient of the Thayer Academy Alumni Achievement Award. Since her retirement Ames has been the Treasurer of the Wellesley Student's Aid Society. On the occasion of her 80^th birthday, the Student's Aid Society established a scholarship in her name. She serves on the board of the Bacon Free Library in South Natick. Ames continues to be very busy with committee work in the community, the church and at the college.

Since her retirement Ames has divided her time between South Natick and Francistown, NH. She and her husband, George, enjoy spending time with their three sons and four grandsons.

In June 2000 Mary Ellen Ames was the recipient of the Wellesley College Alumnae Association's Syrena Stackpole award, given annually in recognition of an alumna's dedicated service and exceptional commitment to the Wellesley College.

In the 1965 record book of class of 1940 Ames offered the following advice, "Manage to find that extra ounce of patience when you think your own store of it has been exhausted; try to take each day as a gift and treat it that way; and have a sense of humor about things (especially about yourself)."

Written by Wilma Slaight