New York CityOrphan train movementUp to 30,000 homeless children in one city, in peacetime. Where were their parents?From 1854 to 1929 the trains moved about 200,000 children. In 1850 there were an estimated 10,000 to 30,000 homeless children in New York City alone.
Photo: Sisters of Charity of St. Vincent de Paul of New York · Public domain · via Wikimedia Commons
Orphan Trains · Upper East Side, United States (approx.)
Sister Irene FitzGibbon, Foundling founder
The open question
A full city block for abandoned babies. Who was leaving them?
On the record
Sister Mary Irene FitzGibbon (born Catherine Rosamund FitzGibbon; May 12, 1823 – August 14, 1896), commonly known as Sister Irene, was an American nun who founded the New York Foundling Hospital in 1869, at a time when abandoned infants were usually sent to almshouses with the sick and insane. As the number of infants in care grew, the Foundling Hospital came to occupy a full city block between 68th and 69th Streets.
- Year
- 1869
- Kind
- agency
Sources
More from Orphan Trains
New York CityOrphan train movementUp to 30,000 homeless children in one city, in peacetime. Where were their parents?From 1854 to 1929 the trains moved about 200,000 children. In 1850 there were an estimated 10,000 to 30,000 homeless children in New York City alone.
Dowagiac, MichiganFirst orphan train stop, DowagiacA train of children shows up and families pick them at the station. Who checked where they went?In 1854 Dowagiac was the final stop for the first group of orphans brought west from New York; children were dropped off and taken in at the depot.
Concordia, KansasNational Orphan Train ComplexChildren stood on a stage and said their names. How many lost those names afterwards?A museum in the restored Union Pacific depot. Some children were walked from the depot into a playhouse and put on stage, said by the museum to be the origin of 'up for adoption'.
New York CityChildren's Aid SocietyBusinessmen paid to send city children to farms. Who needed the labour, and who gained?Founded in 1853 by Charles Loring Brace with money from New York businessmen; one of the three charities behind the orphan trains.