Faith Witte, the mother of an eleven-month-old baby girl, tells what she gets from contact with members of the oldest generation. “I have drawn encouragement from them for looking ahead,” she says. “They lived through it and they’re enjoying their later years.”

Of one older woman in particular, Jennie Glass, who is almost ninety-two, she says, “I thought she was around seventy-five. I really hope I can be like her. It gives me encouragement for getting older.”

These remarks sound like a gerontologist’s dream, eloquent testimony to the advantages of personal contact between generations. People who are decades younger can indeed find inspiration from older people.  And, of course, older people can in turn draw stimulus from those much younger than they.

On the afternoon of my conversation with her, Faith Witte was one of five mothers sitting on the rug and playing with their children in a living room on the top floor  of Cabot Park Village, an assisted living community located in Newtonville. This gathering place is called the Nurturing Room and is the site of an unusual, perhaps unique, set of social interactions.

The generations come together as participants in the “Nurturing Rooms for Mothers and Infants” program sponsored by Jewish Family & Children’s Service. The group at Cabot Park Village, comes together two afternoons each week. The space is filled with the noise of small children chattering, gurgling, and sometimes screaming, along with adults talking animatedly with one another. Some half dozen residents of the retirement community are usually there, among them Jennie Glass, the lead volunteer.

The program at this site is one of  only two groups thus far; the other is located in Randolph. A third is scheduled to begin in October at the Youville House, an assisted living residence in Cambridge. To credit the remarks of the people taking part in the Cabot Park setting, the nurturing room seems to be having a remarkable effect.

With well-organized succinctness, Faith Witte summarizes the impact the nurturing room has had on her: 1) her daughter gets to associate with other kids of different ages;  2) it gives the mothers a chance to relax; and 3) her grandparents do not live nearby so it makes association with older people possible.

An entirely unexpected effect on at least one older person was dramatized for me when I interviewed a woman whose name I have agreed not to publish. When I asked her what the room meant to her, she said “It’s delightful because the children are so sweet.” She went on to tell me about having had two children herself a long time ago when , she said, things were very different. Though this woman did not have much else to say, she often laughed sympathetically as she observed the children playing.

Then, I moved over to talk with a gentleman who turned out to be the woman’s husband. When he heard that his wife had talked with me about being there, he was astounded. He could not believe that I did not suspect anything about her condition. “She has Alzheimer’s,” he revealed. “I don’t know how she made out with you.”

The husband also described the good effect that coming to the nurturing room has on his wife: “When she comes here, her face lights up like she’s a new person.” Confirming the value of her visits, he adds: “It’s only because of her that I’m here.”

This exchange was instructive for me. It makes me wonder if settings like the nurturing room might be the best kind of environment for some people with dementia. Maybe contact with young children enables them to draw upon mental and emotional powers that otherwise remain inaccessible. Of course, the woman in question seems to be in the earlier stages of the disease.

Another mother, Sarah Bengelsdorf, pronounces her own grandmother “the wisest woman I know.” But the grandmother lives in Atlanta so they don’t get to see one another very often. That’s why Sarah values contact with the residents of Cabot Park.

“It’s nice to see the people from that generation,” she tells me. “They really enjoy the children and vice-versa.” With disarming humility, she says of them, “They know a lot more than I do about families and children.”

A woman whose apartment is the closest to the nurturing room, Dorothy Bronstein, enthuses about the chance to take part in the activities. “What could be better than to see the kids?” she exclaims. “It brings back wonderful memories.”

The person who invited me to visit is Diane Nahabedian, Director of Marketing Communications for JF&CS. A reader of this column, she feels pride that her agency has taken the lead in establishing the Nurturing Room.

The agency has kept up with the times in recognizing the importance of providing support for early nurturing. And yet, she says, this program is traditional and has some continuity with other services offered by her agency, founded in 1864. “It’s a program that is catching on,” she says as she looks ahead.

Richard Griffin