The Committee on Recreational Services was formed at the end of 1952. It was initially an outgrowth of the Department of Occupational Therapy where a group made up primarily of volunteers was starting to implement a program of recreational activities in patients’ care. Doctor Lendon Snedeker acted as Chairman for the Committee from its organization until the Committee was dissolved around 1966. The Committee was immediately occupied in developing a job description for the role of Director of Recreational Therapy. The Committee also immersed itself in the growth and refinement of the program, especially with the aid of Sally Staub who submitted a report on her observations on the effects of hospitalization on children. A need for educational activities was soon recognized and the group was renamed the Committee on Patient Education and Recreation in January 1958.

At this time a study was carried out by Margaret Linnehan, a teacher on sabbatical from the Boston school system, to determine the future direction of the program. A grant was awarded to the Department of Occupational Therapy by the Child Study Association of America, and Joyce Langley (later Joyce Meyer) was hired as the Coordinator of the Department. Her skills were well matched to the task at hand since she was a registered nurse as well as a nursery school teacher.

Programs were initiated to instruct nurses in recreational techniques and attempts were made to integrate classroom teaching into the wards. Langely married Dr. Roger Meye in 1959 and left the hospital to raise a family. She was succeeded by Barbara Patterson in 1961, who brought an element of behavioral and developmental observation to the program. During her tenure the program was also renamed the Children’s Activities Service. Staff in the Department were known as Child Activity Specialists. In 1965, a conference for hospital recreational workers drawn from major children’s hospitals in the Eastern United States was held at Children’s. It was the first of its kind and let directly to the organization of the American Association for the Care of Children in Hospitals.

After Patterson left the hospital in 1968, and the Committee had been dissolved an Ad Hoc Committee was formed to deliberate on future programs for recreation and education. In this period Julie H. Snow and Myra D. Fox were hired as co-directors of the Activities Service. From this time the department transitioned to its current title of Child Life Services.