STARTING AT DAWN: 50 YEARS OF BEING A MORNING PERSON
For 50 years, Shirley Smith has been expressing her love for Salem College and Academy students through fluffy eggs, decadent desserts and succulent cinnamon rolls.
Yesterday friends, family and co-workers joined Smith at a reception at Salem Academy to honor her many years of service.
Smith, 67, attributed her longevity at the school to the "grace of God" and said she has no plans to retire anytime soon.
"I can retire when the bills stop coming," she said in an interview.
She said that the group of people who work in the kitchen have made her years pleasant.
"They're not employees," she said. "They're not co-workers. They're sisters and brothers."
Smith started working in the kitchen at Salem College in 1960. She was a student at Columbia Heights High School and needed the money, she said.
"We were poor," she said. "You had to work and work and work."
She moved to Salem Academy three years later, and has been there since then. Smith speaks of those early days with her characteristic bluntness and humor.
"I got married and had my two knuckleheads," she said, speaking of her sons. "I had to work. I still have to work."
Smith has missed very few days of work in 50 years, her co-workers said, and has been known to walk to work in the snow.
She arrives at 5:30 a.m. to start breakfast, where she is known for her "Academy rolls, a variation on a cinnamon bun. She works in a neat backroom with the radio tuned to a gospel-music station.
After breakfast, she starts baking cookies and desserts.
Years ago, Kim Mendenhall, the manager of the academy's dining service, said that the academy tried to substitute store-bought cookies for Smith's chocolate-chip cookies, which are served during the students' 10 a.m. break from classes. The move was not popular with students.
"That lasted about two minutes," Mendenhall said. "Miss Shirley has to make fresh chocolate-chip cookies every day."
Once the day's cookies are made, Smith starts peeling and chopping fruits and vegetables for the salad bar.
By 1:30, her workday is over.
Some of students' favorite dishes are made from recipes she inherited from retiring cooks. She refuses to divulge the secret ingredients for such things as French toast and Hello Dollies, which are made from layers of graham crackers, chocolate, milk, nuts and coconut. Alumnae often request the treats for special events, she said.
Audra Aldrich, a senior at the academy, who stopped by yesterday to honor Smith, said that the relationship between students and kitchen workers is often close.
"They're kind of involved with our lives," Aldrich said. "We're so appreciative of them because they care about us."
Karl Sjolund, the head of Salem Academy, said that people such as Smith are often passed over, but that their quiet sense of leadership and duty are important parts of the institutions they serve.
"It's easy to take it for granted sometimes, to walk into the dining hall and have this wonderful spread," Sjolund said. "We forget that someone's been there since the crack of dawn, doing it with real heart."
mgiunca@wsjournal.com
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