NOTHAMPTON — Anne (Seman) Lello was “cookie lady” to the children in her Chicago neighborhood: any child who came knocking for a cookie was greeted with a sweet treat, and Anne stockpiled cookies just for them.

But Anne’s daughter, Denise Lello of Northampton, remembers the “cookie lady” for more than her cookies.

Denise recalls her many cousins seeking out her mother for help and support and how Anne hosted a couple of her cousins’ weddings in her backyard. Denise tears up thinking about her mother’s birthday parties for her father on New Year’s Day, an annual event she and her family cherish.

“Between 50 and 70 people had come to spend the afternoon for (my father’s) birthday, and it was something that all the cousins enjoyed and remembered,” Denise said.

But more than the cookies and family gatherings, Anne’s legacy lies in her commitment to the education and well-being of children through her four jobs: a pediatric nurse, a teacher, a Montessori school director and a mother.

This year, Denise honored her mother’s memory with a $100 donation to the Sidney F. Smith Toy Fund.

Named after a former business manager at the Gazette, the Toy Fund began in 1933 to help families in need during the Depression. Today, the fund distributes vouchers worth $50 to qualifying families for each child from age 1 to 14.

Anne’s enduring achievement, besides Denise and her two siblings, is opening Oaklawn Montessori School, a pre-K and kindergarten school that she opened in 1975 and directed until 1990. Denise worked with her mother at the school for a year and witnessed her teach children with behavioral challenges and hearing and visual impairments.

“This was a long time ago, before we actually had special education, and she was remarkable at welcoming all kinds of children and being very successful at incorporating them into the classrooms,” Denise said.

Anne taught children using the Montessori method during her time teaching and directing education. This method is an alternative teaching style based on each child’s own interests, hands-on learning and real-world skills rather than a set curriculum. Some of the lessons Anne used include playing with soap, peeling carrots and polishing silver.

“All the activities have some sort of domestic association that the children could see happening in their world,” Denise said. “This gave them a sense of competence, but also those sensory things that children love, like playing in flowers or playing with water, have a lot of tactile sort of meaning.”

Denise specifically remembers one vision-impaired child whose parents struggled to cater to her specific needs, but the child’s time at Oaklawn helped the family connect.

“And so during her time in school with my mom, she just blossomed into a child who could relate to other people, and her parents could begin to sort of understand how to respond to her and help her,” she said.

Anne’s desire to work with children started long before her teaching days. Anne worked as a pediatric nurse at St. Vincent’s Hospital in Chicago. She and both of her sisters attended St. Vincent’s Nursing School together and graduated in the 1930s. Denise said her mother spent most of her career in medicine comforting sick children with chronic diseases and young mothers who gave their babies up for adoption.

“She talked about how heartbreaking it was for these young women to give up their babies at birth and not be able to see their babies or hold them.”

After spending most of her life in Chicago, Anne went to live with Denise in Northampton for the last couple months of her life. Denise said she had a very good relationship with her mother and feels grateful for the time they shared in Northampton.

“She was very Catholic, and I was not as I entered my adolescence, so we did butt heads quite a bit, but I learned a lot from her,” Denise said. “We butted heads a lot about things, (but) we shared a lot of perspectives and that made it both harder and easier.”

To be eligible for the Toy Fund, families must live in any Hampshire County community except Ware, or in the southern Franklin County towns of Deerfield, Sunderland, Whately, Shutesbury and Leverett, and in Holyoke in Hampden County.

The following stores are participating this year: A2Z Science and Learning Store, 57 King St., Northampton; Blue Marble/Little Blue, 150 Main St., Level 1, Northampton; Deals & Steals, 1 Pearl St., Northampton; High Five Books, 141 N. Main St., Florence; The Toy Box, 201 N. Pleasant St., Amherst; Once Upon A Child,1458 Riverdale St., West Springfield; Plato’s Closet, 1472 Riverdale St., West Springfield; Sam’s Outdoor Outfitters, 227 Russell St., Hadley; Odyssey Bookshop, 9 College St., Village Commons, South Hadley; The Eric Carle Museum of Picture Book Art, 125 W. Bay Road, Amherst; World Eye Bookshop, 134 Main St., Greenfield; Holyoke Sporting Goods Co., and 1584 Dwight St. No. 1, Holyoke.

Emilee Klein can be reached at eklein@gazettenet.com.