Best Helping Hands (page 4 of 4)

• Best of America

The Ultimate Chick Magnet

Now 25, Minnie was originally placed with another Helping Hands client, who became too sick to care for her. She was then reassigned to Cook, as capuchins live an average of 40 years -- four times the life span of a Seeing Eye dog.

Helping Hands began in 1979 as an experimental project at Tufts University, combining rehabilitation engineering, occupational therapy and behavioral psychology. Initially, the monkeys were rescued from animal labs. Today, the program has its own breeding colony at Southwick's Zoo in Mendon, Massachusetts. For their first five years, the capuchins live with nondisabled foster families so they can enjoy a childhood complete with toys and tummy kisses, and interact socially with humans and household pets. In the foster homes and at Monkey College, they learn that large white dots mean "Don't touch." And round stickers are placed in doorways or on stoves to keep the monkeys away. "We don't want people to lose their heirloom china just because they have a monkey helper," says Helping Hands cofounder Judi Zazula.

Training, supplies and lifetime care for a capuchin can cost $35,000, but Helping Hands monkeys are provided to approved clients for free. So far, Helping Hands has made 116 pairings for clients like Cook and others with mobility-limiting conditions such as Lou Gehrig's disease, muscular dystrophy, multiple sclerosis and stroke.

Thanks to the Americans with Disabilities Act, Minnie can go pretty much anywhere Cook does. At restaurants, "she gets me good tables," he quips.

Cook also credits Minnie with helping him hook up with his girlfriend of nearly a year, Chelle Corr, a 43-year-old event planner. "A friend placed an ad for me on an online dating service: 'Man in wheelchair and his monkey looking for Jane,'" says Cook. "And Chelle replied." When Minnie first met her in person, she greeted her with a tiny monkey high-five. "She has always been the ultimate chick magnet," Cook laughs.

Minnie is good at reading moods too. When Cook is down, she strokes his eyebrows, face and head. "We share a bond," Cook says. "She got me out of my depression over being in a wheelchair. Once Minnie arrived, I never looked back."

From Reader's Digest - May 2007