In New Jersey: Day Care with a Lot of Caring

For five years Bertha Kimbrough made parade shoes and walkie-talkie packs in a factory. Before that, for 22 years, she folded sheets in a laundry. Now she diapers babies. "Gee whiz," she says, "dozens of diapers a day! Sweet potatoes for lunch! I do a lot of changes, you get dishpan hands."

Bertha works -- and has for the past six years -- with two-month-olds to 30- month-olds at the Mercer Children's Center in Trenton. She has scrapbooks at home with photos of all the children. "When I get home at night, I just jumps into bed and visualizes what a...