Love The Children (LTC) - US


Please Note: If you are adopted through this KSS’ Partner Western Adoption Agency (in the time frames during which KSS worked with this Partner Western Adoption Agency) then you should initiate a Birth Family Search through KSS in Seoul. For KSS Adoptees ONLY, please see: Step by Step Korea Social Service (KSS) Birth Family Search.

1978 - Unknown: KSS only partnered with Love The Children for a short period of time. We do not know exactly when the partnership between KSS and Love The Children ended, but we do not believe that the partnership lasted for very long.

Love The Children appears to have closed in 2014.

Love The Children was founded by former Welcome House Executive Director Mary L. Graves, after she was fired from Welcome House around 1978 or 1979.

We find it interesting that the partnership between KSS and Love The Children did not last for very long. Love The Children appears to have gone on to work with ECWS / ESWS (Eastern Child Welfare Society / Eastern Social Welfare Society) - commonly known as Eastern - after its partnership with KSS concluded.

+

Mary L. Graves - Welcome House + Love The Children:

https://lovethechildrenblog.wordpress.com/ 

https://lovethechildrenblog.wordpress.com/about-ltcr/

”About LTCR 

Love the Children of Rochester, Inc. is an adoptee/adoptive family support group that was once connected to the adoption agency, Love the Children of Pennsylvania.

Mary Graves worked at an adoption agency called Welcome House. As an adoptee herself, she had a strong passion for connecting children with permanent families. While in a hotel in Korea, Mary Graves met Cecelia Park. Cecelia was trained as a concert pianist and was performing in the hotel. Mary approached Cecelia to ask for directions. The two became friends.

Cecelia knew nothing about adoption or being part of an adoption agency. She was very impressed with the work Mary was doing to help the children in her country. Eventually she came to the United States to work with Mary. Shortly after Cecelia arrived, Mary started Love the Children (LTC), which was located in Pennsylvania. Cecelia was instrumental in forming the relationship between LTC and the agency they worked with in Korea, Eastern Social Welfare Society. This close relationship was critical to the success of Love the Children.

In 1979 LTC placed their first child with a U.S. family. Initially they placed older children, who were difficult to place and had been living in orphanages for many years. As time went on, they started to do more infant adoptions.


Mary had a very good “business” sense as it related to running the agency. Cecelia was often described as the “loving heart” of the agency. They complimented each other very well.

For the first 20 years of the agency’s existence, Mary and Cecelia made the 2 and ½ drive to meet every plane in NY to greet the babies and their families.

In 1997, Mary Graves died. Cecelia was named Acting Director, then Director of Love the Children. Cecelia continued the strong commitment to the children of Korea. It was not just a job for her – it was something she did 24 hours a day. She called Korea every evening (morning in Korea). When the babies got home, she would call them on the phone. She would tell them that they were safe and loved by their new family. Each summer she traveled to upstate NY to attend picnics and visit with the babies and families. Twice a year she went to Korea to visit and check on the babies who were waiting to come home. Cecelia was Director of Love the Children until she passed away in 2011.

Love the Children Agency

Mary and Cecelia (and the caseworkers) created an agency that was very different from other agencies. They had an extraordinary commitment to the children of Korea. They spent much time and resources giving back to the country they worked with.

Unique aspects of LTC:

  • They required that each major city within the states they worked in had a Parent Support Group. Support groups were set up in cities like Rochester, Buffalo, Syracuse, Boston, and Pittsburg. They wanted to create these groups so the children could socialize with families like their own. Rochester’s LTC parent support group has been in existence for 40 years and is still active today. We are now known at Love the Children of Rochester, Inc.

  • They asked each family who adopted through LTC to make a commitment to supporting the agency and the children of Korea.

  • They created criteria for adoptive families that upheld Korea’s values (such as education levels).

  • The agency/parent groups fundraised and sent money to help the children of Korea (through Eastern). Over the years LTC financed:

    • The building of a children’s hospital

    • 3 schools (elementary, middle school, and high school) for students with disabilities

    • The van (called the “Love Mobile”) that transports the children from Eastern to the airport to make their flight to the US.

Love the Children of Pennsylvania closed in 2014. At the current time, Cecelia Park’s sister, Mrs. June Oh, continues to advocate on behalf of Love the Children families and the children of Korea. She attends the yearly Lunar New Year celebration sponsored by Love the Children of Rochester, Inc.”

+

“A SALUTE TO MARY GRAVES HON. BENJAMIN A. GILMAN OF NEW YORK IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES Wednesday, September 22, 1982  Mr. GILMAN.

“Mr. Speaker, it is a privilege to rise today to recognize the great contribution that Mary Graves, now the executive director of Love the Children Adoption Agency, has made and continues to make in bringing love and shelter to orphans throughout the world. On Saturday, October 9, 1982, a testimonial dinner will be held to honor this fine woman who has worked to place nearly 4,000 orphaned children throughout the world in adoptive homes in the United States. For those here and abroad without a permanent home, she spends exhausting hours searching for funds to improve medical facilities and other structures housing these children. She also raises money for their food, clothing, and medicine. I urge my colleagues to join me today in saluting a remarkable human being, who knew the agonies of being an orphan firsthand, and put this knowledge into action to change the lives of thousands of children here and all over the world. During her first years as a social worker in the United States, her love and concern for children in broken homes-those who do not know the joy and security of a loving family-increasingly involved her in adoption work. She became the director of an adoption agency called Welcome House, founded by Pearl Buck, where she worked for 17 years. As director of Welcome House, she concentrated her efforts on placing those American children who are most difficult to place-those with medical and physical conditions and difficult backgrounds. Between 1961 and 1970 she placed 733 of these children, which included those up to the ages of 16 and 17. While she was director of Welcome House, the need for placement of overseas children increased dramatically, and during this time she placed in homes over 3,200 children from Vietnam, Korea, Hong Kong, India, El Salvador, Peru, Colombia, and Pakistan. In 1978 she began the "Love the Children" agency, which was first approved as an adoption agency in Pennsylvania and later in New Jersey and New York. There she has continued and expanded her amazing work with homeless children all over the world. Through spartan management techniques and volunteer efforts, she has been able to use practically all funds coming into the agency for projects rather than administrative expenses. In February 1979, a new association was established between Love the Children and Eastern Child Welfare Society in Seoul, South Korea. Mary Graves initiated this relationship with the idea that Love the Children would fill the need it had been filling so well in the United States to assist in the placement of those children most difficult to place. 

In South Korea, as in all other countries where Mary Graves has concentrated her efforts, she began programs to improve the lives of the families and children permanently. The Eastern Child Welfare Society, with Mary Graves' help, now combines a number of programs to make a difference in the lives of the poor in South Korea. These include an incountry and intercountry adoption program placing children in Korean and American homes, a foster care program, a sponsorship progam assisting parents in paying for secondary education, and pregnancy counseling, and prenatal care. Mary Graves has always been ready to tackle the most important need at hand; she is now heading up a drive to raise money to construct the Eastern Child Welfare Center in Seoul, South Korea, to provide sufficient space for the activities of the Eastern Child Welfare Society and to expand these programs to include a hospital clinic for obstetric and pediatric care. Having followed the life and works of this great woman, gives us assurance that she will reach her goal and realize her dream for this clinic. Mary Graves has seen a desperate need in the eyes of the homeless and has put the power of her love, determination, and faith to work to substitute hope for despair. Accordingly, I urge my colleagues to join me in saluting this amazing human being, who, in a time when resources seem so scarce and the needs so great, brings us all new hope as she has brought it to thousands of young lives throughout our world. Onward, Mary Graves. May the dream of the Child Welfare Center soon be a reality. We know its completion will only be a stepping stone for another of your remarkable leaps into the rough waters to build another bridge for peace.”

+

https://careawo.org/adoption-is-choosing-to-love-a-fathers-story/ 

June 20, 2020

“Ironically Mary Graves who visited the Korean orphanages often told us that it was fairly common to observe large crib-like structures with upwards of 4 children in them. But, thank God, we passed and were “matched” via picture with a cute chubby one month old Korean girl in February 1977 that we were told had been abandoned on the steps of a Seoul police station (a frequent story).

Then we received a call from Mary Graves that as a protest to the U.S. decision to remove troops from South Korea, the Korea Social Service was going to put a limit on the number of adoptions by U.S. citizens. Now there was a great urgency to obtain that green card. One more unsatisfactory phone conversation with Immigration and Naturalization Services convinced me that we needed help from higher authority.

Enter U.S. Congressman Ed Forsythe, our representative from Moorestown, NJ. When I explained the situation to him, he promised to intervene with INS. Incredibly, I got a call from INS two days later that Jennifer’s green card was approved. I immediately called Mary Graves to tell her the good news. She said that while that was indeed good news, Jennifer could not be placed on an airplane to fly to Kennedy airport until the approval was delivered by U.S. diplomatic courier to the government of South Korea and that she did not think there was time to do that since it was Friday and the next scheduled flight from Seoul to Kennedy was Monday. She had been informed that that flight would be the last for adoptees. Our hearts sank but only for about an hour.

About an hour after Mary’s call Representative Forsythe’s assistant called to tell us that a diplomatic courier was en route to Seoul via U.S. military aircraft to deliver the necessary paper work and that Jennifer would be on the plane Monday. Prior to my call to him I had never spoken to nor met Ed Forsythe but he had my vote until his death.

But as Paul Harvey used to say, “And now, the rest of the story”. Jane and I drove to Kennedy airport on a hot May day to meet our daughter for the first time and bring her to her new home. We ran through the airport (heavy traffic delays) with Jane carrying a new outfit for Jennifer (we had been warned that the clothing the children, 25 in total, would be wearing might be a little soiled and ill fitting) being waved around security by an officer who obviously had seen this scene before. We arrived at the gate early enough to witness the Delta flight making its final approach. The gate attendant asked me if she could bring our daughter off the plane instead of one of the five chaperones who had been with the children. I said fine with me if the chaperones agreed. Jennifer was the last to disembark in the arms of the gate attendant whose name escapes me. She was dressed immaculately in a brand new onesie and had the biggest smile on her face, almost as big as mine. Jane of course was in tears. 

Now our dear daughter Jennifer is married to a wonderful man, James, with two children Lila and Andrew, and a furry pup Guapo, who are all the apple of Mimi and Pop Pop’s eyes.   

-Jack Costigan

Father to Jennifer Evans. Father in law to James Evans.”