Davidson laundry worker cared ‘like a grandmother’ for generations of students

For six decades, Lula Bell Houston met nearly every Davidson College student through her work in the college laundry.

Up until a couple years ago, the college provided the unusual perk of free laundry services. “She was like a grandmother to folks,” said Joe Harris, who graduated in 2002.

Houston, who lived in Cornelius, was also a gospel choir member as well as a mother, grandmother and great-grandmother. She died Nov. 24 at age 94.

During his four years at Davidson, Harris said he saw Houston every couple of weeks when he dropped off clothes, but sometimes, he went to the laundry just to chat with her. She could always lift his spirits when school got stressful, he said.

She would ask how his classes were going and what he’d been up to that weekend. She’d check on his friends, by name, if she hadn’t seen them in a while.

“I wasn’t unique in that regard, because she really took the time to get to know students,” said Harris, a member of Davidson’s Board of Visitors.

Houston retired for the first time in 2004, and Davidson named the laundry building after her. She ended up working part-time for a few years after that. Harris said she insisted that spending time around young people gave her energy.

By 2004, Harris was working for then-U.S. Rep. John Spratt of South Carolina. He learned that Spratt, who graduated from Davidson in the 1960s, also remembered Houston well.

Harris said he’ll never forget Houston’s face when he showed her the proclamation Spratt read in her honor on the floor of the U.S. House of Representatives.

The town councils of Davidson and Cornelius each honored Houston upon her retirement. Her family said she was dedicated to her community and to Gethsemane Baptist Church in Davidson, where she sang in the choir.

Singing was an important part of her life, daughter Peggy Rivens said. She founded the Gethsemane Gospel Singers alongside her mother and sang with the group for nearly 70 years.

When Davidson students started doing their own laundry in 2015, the college had to find a new way to pay respect to Houston.

In October, a month before she died, Houston attended the dedication ceremony for a resource center at Davidson called Lula Bell’s.

The space provides food, professional and winter clothing, school supplies and personal hygiene items to students in need. It also offers seminars on topics like credit scores and operates a lending-library system for cooking and cleaning supplies and textbooks.

Harris said he thinks it’s the perfect way to honor somebody who was “in the business of improving students’ lives.”

This story was originally published November 30, 2017 at 5:53 PM with the headline "Davidson laundry worker cared ‘like a grandmother’ for generations of students."