The Orphan Trains

From the 1850s through the 1920s, New York City was teeming with tens of thousands of homeless and orphaned children. To survive, these so-called "street urchins" resorted to begging, stealing, or forming gangs to commit violence. Some children worked in factories and slept in doorways or flophouses. The children roamed the streets and slums with little or no hope of a successful future. Their numbers were stunningly large; an estimated 30,000 children were homeless in New York City in the 1850s.

Charles Loring Brace, the founder of The Children's Aid Society, believed that there was a way to change the futures of these children. By removing youngsters from the poverty and debauchery of the city streets and placing them in morally upright farm families, he thought they would have a chance to escape a lifetime of suffering.

Brace proposed that these children be sent by train to live and work on farms out west. They would be placed in homes for free, but they would serve as an extra pair of hands to help with chores around the farm. They wouldn't be indentured. In fact, older children placed by The Children's Aid Society were to be paid for their labors.

The Orphan Train Movement lasted from 1853 to the 1920s, placing more than 120,000 children. Most of these children survived into adulthood, married, and had children of their own. Several million Americans today can find former Orphan Train children in their family trees.

Orphan Trains stopped at more than 45 states across the country, as well as Canada and Mexico. During the early years, Indiana received the largest number of children. There were numerous agencies nationwide that placed children on trains to go to foster homes. In New York, besides Children's Aid, other agencies that placed children included Children's Village (then known as the New York Juvenile Asylum), what is now New York Foundling Hospital, and the former Orphan Asylum Society of the City of New York, which is now the Graham-Windham Home for Children. Not all the children were from New York City. Children from Albany and other cities in New York state were transported, as were some from Boston, Massachusetts, where the Boston Children's Services merged with the New England Home For Little Wanderers, which also is still active today.

Only a few of the Orphan Train children are alive today, and most were too young at the time to remember their experiences. However, a few elderly Americans can recall their experiences on the Orphan Trains.

Stanley Cornell and his brother are amongst the last generation of Orphan Train riders. When asked about his experience, Mr. Cornell replied, "We'd pull into a train station, stand outside the coaches dressed in our best clothes. People would inspect us like cattle farmers. And if they didn't choose you, you'd get back on the train and do it all over again at the next stop."

Cornell and his brother were "placed out" twice with their aunts in Pennsylvania and Coffeyville, Kansas. Unfortunately, these placements didn't last, and they were returned to the Children's Aid Society.

"Then they made up another train. Sent us out West. A hundred-fifty kids on a train to Wellington, Texas," Cornell recalls. "That's where Dad happened to be in town that day."

Each time an Orphan Train was sent out, adoption ads appeared in local papers before the arrival of the children.

J.L. Deger, a 45-year-old farmer, knew he wanted a boy, even though he already had two daughters, ages 10 and 13.

"He'd just bought a Model T. Mr. Deger looked those boys over. We were the last boys holding hands in a blizzard, December 10, 1926," Cornell remembers. He says that day he and his brother stood in a hotel lobby.

"He asked us if we wanted to move out to farm with chickens, pigs, and a room all to your own. He only wanted to take one of us, decided to take both of us."

Life on the farm was hard work.

"I did have to work and I expected it, because they fed me, clothed me, loved me. We had a good home. I'm very grateful. Always have been, always will be."

Cornell eventually got married. He and his wife, Earleen, now live in Pueblo, Colorado. His brother, Victor Cornell, a retired movie theater chain owner, is also alive and living in Moscow, Idaho.

Stanley Cornell believes he and his brother are two of only 15 surviving Orphan Train children.

Some of the children struggled in their newfound surroundings, while many others went on to lead simple, very normal lives, raising their families and working towards the American dream. Although records weren't always well kept, some of the children placed in the West went on to great successes. There were two governors, one congressman, one sheriff, two district attorneys, and three county commissioners, as well as numerous bankers, lawyers, physicians, journalists, ministers, teachers, and businessmen.

The Orphan Train Movement and the success of other children's aid initiatives led to a host of child welfare reforms, including child labor laws, adoption and foster care services, public education, and the provision of health care and nutrition and vocational training.

The Orphan Train Heritage Society of America in Concordia, Kansas, serves as a clearinghouse of information about the estimated 150,000 children who were "placed out" from 1854 to 1929. It helps members establish and maintain family contacts, retrace their roots, and preserve the history of the Orphan Train Movement. The Society did maintain a web site although that appears to be offline at the moment.

Other web sites that provide information about America's Orphan Trains may be found at http://www.orphantraindepot.com, http://www.childrensaidsociety.org/orphantrains?gclid=CNjBx9rt4ZcCFQG7Ggode16L7A, http://www.encyclopediaofarkansas.net/encyclopedia/entry-detail.aspx?entryID=2400, http://www.nebraskahistory.org/sites/mnh/orphans, and http://encyclopedia.adoption.com/entry/Orphan-Train-Heritage-Society-of-America-Inc-OTHSA/267/1.html

Comments

[Elyse]

Wow - how interesting!!

[judlab]

Sounds like the same concept as the British Home Children sent from England to Canada at the turn of the century. They were to be taken into loving caring homes but in many cases the children were treated badly. My husband’s grandfather, aunt and uncle were sent from Dr. Barnardo's orphanage to Canada in 1899 after their parents died. My husband’s grandfather never talked about it and we only discovered he was a Barnardo child and the sad history of the three children a few years ago.

[Colleen]

You can also find info on Iowa orphan trains at:

http://iagenweb.org/hamilton/

Look on the lower right side of the page.

[Bill Dow, Texas]

A similar circumstance happened in Britain where from the 1850's until as late as 1960's, over 160,000 children were "placed out" to families in Canada, Australia and New Zealand.

My father was one of these "British Home Children" and was shipped out to Canada from Scotland in 1914 at the age of 10. He spent several years working on various farms in Ontario and eventually made his way to the United States.

Contrary to the US Orphan Train children, there was a stigma attached to being a "British Home Child" as many of these children were thought to be taking jobs away from the Canadian labor market. As a result, most Home Children never admitted to being one even to their closet friends or loved ones. My father took his secret to the grave with him. It was only after I investigated stories he told about life on the farms and he vagueness about his past that I discovered this. I have since been in contact and met some of my 2nd cousins in England and Scotland.

In 1998, the British government, although not admitting any wrongdoing, set aside one and a half million pounds to pay expenses for survivors to return to the city of their origins to reconnect with their lost family members. Unfortunately, my father died about two years before this.

Anyone interested in the British Home Children can Google it and obtain several sites including the Canadian National Archives that have information on these children.

[john lauck]

My great grandmother was born in 1846 supposedly in michigan but with her sister she was listed as an orphan. I wonder if she could have been part of this movement. Any help????

[Alice Holtin]

In 1989, the program "Unsolved Mysteries" ran a segment on the orphan trains. It was filmed in the Northwest Arkansas area which had several orphan trains to make stops there. Because we had a family of four boys, we auditioned and were chosen to be in the program.

We were fortunate to meet those Orphan Train Riders who were spotlighted in the program. As a family researcher their stories always intrigued me. Some of the smaller children were adopted "in advance" of the trip. Their name, and their adoptive family's name, would be embroidered on their clothes (on the hem of the girls' skirts, or inside the boys' jackets).

This program united a brother living in New York and a sister living in Nebraska who had been chosen by different families and had not seen each other in seventy years. It is still being aired on some channels.

It was an experience we'll never forget.

[Gordon Banks]

Utah Phillips wrote a wonderful song about the "Orphan Train." I found this amateur performance on You-Tube which isn't too shabby.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dluUNy6-kJk

[Michael Carroll]

OTHSA merged with NOTC:

According to info currently at:
http://www.orphantraindepot.com/RecentNews.html
the Orphan Train Society of America (OTHSA) merged with the National Orphan Train Complex (NOTC) effective 1 Jan 2008.

The NOTC web site is:
http://www.orphantraindepot.com

[Jennie Vertrees]

There were several children left with families in my home county, Mercer, Co., MO. There is a lady in Grundy County, MO, Evelyn Trickel, who has done many years of study on the Orphan Train children in Grundy and surrounding counties here in Missouri, including my home county. If anyone wants to contact Evelyn, she lives in Trenton, MO. She has a wealth of information and often gives lectures on the subject.

[Bobbi]

Tom Riley, author, ORPHAN TRAIN RIDERS, Vols. I and II is looking to raise money to establish an Orphan Train museum in New York State. Anyone that is interested can read his blog at:

http://tomsorphantrainridersblog.blogspot.com/

Bobbi

[Barbara Meehan]

Janet Graham and Edward Gray produced a nice film called, "The Orphan Trains," in about 1998 as part of the PBS Video Database of America's History and Culture series (v. 67). Many libraries own copies of the VHS version and some, according to WorldCat, own a 2006 edition in DVD.

[Bil Buchanan]

During my stay with them in Feb 1967, a cousin in England said that she thought that my grandfather Richard Ing had come to Canada as one of the Barnardo Home children, mentioning that she and her husband knew some of the Bernardo family personally. I said that I had never heard of him coming out with Barnardo Homes.

Over 30 years later I discovered the following:

Home Children (1869-1930)
Name: ING Given Name: Richard S Age: 14 Sex: M
Ship: Vancouver Year of Arrival: 1896 Departure Port: Liverpool
Departure Date: 05 March 1896 Arrival Port: Halifax
Arrival Date: 14 March 1896 Party: Not Given
Destination: Hamilton, Ontario Comments: Dr Stephenson’s party of 51 boys
Source: Library and Archives Canada Reference: RG76 C 1 b
Microfilm: C-4517 Type of Record: Passenger Lists
Group of Children Traveling Together
http://www.collectionscanada.gc.ca/databases/home-children/001015-119.01-e.php?&id_nbr=43296&&PHPSESSID=41hdufh4a8j07oc2m4u6v9ch11

Richard was able to re-connect with his brother James Alfred Ing, nine years older, who had come to Canada previously. Both men went on to marry and raise families in western Canada. The two families have remained very close ever since.

[Dae Powell]

Perhaps not so well-known is that William Bonney, Billy the Kid, also travelled on an orphan train. The situations encountered in the west, variable though they were, were usually preferable to the disease, crime and squallor they left. The better we understand the history of the age, the more familiar become the lives of our ancestors.

Happy Dae.
http://ShoeStringGenealogy.com

[joyce patterson]

I have undertaken my husbands family genealogies...his father was one of six siblings who was left homeless and put in an orphange in Jasper Co, MO after the parents died in 1922 and 1925 respectfully.
The two oldest boys escaped and ran off and made their way raised fine families. The youngest William Joe Patterson born 1920 Jasper Co,MO was supposedly gone to NY no foundings on this. Now I am wondering if he was sent to NY as say on an orphan train. Does anyone have information or ideas about the orphans from Jasper Co. or how to find out who adopted them.
thanks, joyce

[Anne Peterson]

The film "Orphan Trains" aired as as part of the American Experience series on PBS stations and is still represented on the American Experience portion of the PBS Web site. The url is:
www.pbs.org/wgbh/amex/orphan/

There is some information about the show, a bibliography, a transcript of the film and a teacher's guide.

[Katie Wilkinson]

I always knew that my maternal grandfather was born in Manhattan, New York, and adopted by a couple who were originally from Scranton, Pennsylania. The story went that they eventually moved to southwestern Missouri and bought a farm there.

But I was puzzled by the fact that I could find absolutely nothing to document my grandfather's birth in Manhattan. I searched New York City birth records for the appropriate time period and even scoured lists of children from various institutions in Manhattan. Nothing! By some stroke of luck, my mother found a small, tissue-thin certificate with my grandfather's birth name and the date of his baptism. The certificate came from St. Vincent Ferrer's Catholic Church - or so I thought. Luckily, the church is still open and maintains many years of documents (Phone number and address on the Net).

Several months after speaking with the parish receptionist and writing to the church secretary explaining my search, I received a phone call. It turned out that my grandfather was not baptized at the church (although the parish name was on the certificate) but at the nearby New York Foundling Hospital. My next step was to request any and all of my grandfather's records from the Hospital's Closed Records Office (you can find the phone number and address on the Net.

Again, several months went by before I received any information. What I did receive was scare: two xeroxed pages from what appeared to be an entry log of some sort and a copy of "placement" form. The entries on the log pages were phrases only, but from them I learned my grandfather had been left in the vestibule of the hospital. From what I can determine, his mother had visited the hospital several times before and was offered assistance. The record states that she "refused help ----- said she was married."
The placement form told me that my grandfather was place out when he was just three years old. He rode a train from Manhattan to Sarcoxie, Missouri.

Sorry for putting up such a long message, but I'm hoping that some of the "clues" or circumstances will sound familiar to some of you and lead your research in a new direction.

[Howard Schack]

Some of the orphen trains did not travel all that far from New York City. Some children traveled on The Erie Railroad as far as Spring Valley, New York where they departed by wagon for the short ride to "Happy Valley" in Pomona, NY. (Happy Valley was not all that happy). I remember that because my father Joseph Schack, the depression owner of Schack Glass Company in Spring Valley sponsored some boys as apprentices in his company. One of the boys, George Brewster,worked for my father until his retirement, becoming an upstanding member of this community. He honorably served in the US Army on the North African front until he was wounded and returned home to re-join my father's business.