Title: Lutheran Resettlement Pioneer Cox Died ELCA NEWS SERVICE - NEWSBRIEF April 7, 1997 CORDELIA COX DIED Cordelia Cox, 95, former director for Lutheran Immigration and Refugee Service , died March 5 in Richmond, Va. Cox became the first woman to head a major Lutheran agency in the United States. During her tenure from 1948 to 1957 Cox led the resettlement of more than 57,000 refugees from the Baltic countries and Eastern Europe, admitted to the United States under separate laws passed by Congress. She saw the refugees as "people of strength, integrity and real ability." Cox helped develop a previously undefined church-state relationship for resettling refugees; she once said, "I think we strengthened both our church and our country immensely." Nearly all U.S. Lutherans cooperated in the resettlement effort. After leaving LIRS and until her retirement in 1961 at age 73, Cox served as executive secretary of the Lutheran Welfare Council of Metropolitan New York. She served as a consultant for the standards-setting Council on Social Work Education from 1961 to 1966 and as a consultant in undergraduate education for the U.S. Department of Health, Education and Welfare from 1966 to 1971. She was also a consultant for training of foreign students in social work. Cox was a member of Lutheran Church of the Reformation, Washington, D.C. LIRS is a joint ministry of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America, the Lutheran Church-Missouri Synod and the Latvian Evangelical Lutheran Church in America. For information contact: Ann Hafften, Director (773) 380-2958 or [log in to unmask] http://www.elca.org/co/news/current.html