OCEAN CITY – New York City in the mid-19th century was not a good place to be if you were a child with no parents who had not provided for your welfare with a financial legacy. Most likely that meant you’d be at best neglected, at worst living on the streets and begging each day for food.
Ocean City Public Library hosted a live video feed Oct. 20 with Paul Clarke. He is an archivist with the Children’s Aid Society who presented a discussion of the “orphan train” movement in conjunction with this year’s “OC Reads” book selection, “Orphan Train,” a novel by Christina Baker Kline.
The nationwide reading program, with individual book selections made by local communities, encourages residents to read the same book and then gather to participate in discussions and events about that book.
The “orphan train” concept was a movement which lasted from 1853 in the early 1900s as a reaction to the large numbers of abandoned children living in Manhattan as well as other cities on the East Coast, including Philadelphia.
By the second decade of the 20th century, social work was burgeoning as a profession and various levels of government were stepping in to provide a more institutionalized approach to the needs of these children.
The orphan train movement was started by Charles Loring Bruce who eventually became the founder of the Children’s Aid Society. According to the society’s website, the unfortunate ranks of these children surpassed 30,000 when the movement got its start.
Ironically, it is thought that Bruce’s objective in initiating the removal of those children from East Coast urban areas was less than altruistic in that he wanted to rid New York of its minor-aged criminals and vagrants and provide free labor to farmers living in the Midwest.
Bruce, who spent two years in Europe in early adulthood, observed how in Germany homes were established where orphans and homeless children could live in a community, learn a trade and eventually be indentured to a craftsman so they could eventually earn their livelihood.
Clarke said, responding to a question, that in the beginning of the euphemistically termed “placing out” service sending children to rural areas, there was no vetting done of receiving families.
“Fliers were placed around a particular town, frequently where there might be a minister connection, and families would come to the largest hall available to choose the child they would take home. As time went on, the process became more systematized but the early years were not well regulated at all,” said Clarke.
It was thought that life in a rural area would be more beneficial for those children than staying in dirty, noisy, disease-ridden urban areas even if their new families were not approved beforehand. Foster children, just like birth children of those families, were expected to work. Contact with their birth parents was discouraged.
The novel itself is a historical fiction centered around an imagined character, Vivian Daly, an Irish immigrant, whose childhood and the rest of her life until her death at age 90 are greatly influenced by her trip on the orphan train.
Given the broad effects of the orphan train there are families in Cape May County who can count relatives going back a few generations who were “orphan train” children. A number of children from New York City and Philadelphia were placed in rural areas in South Jersey.
Several people in the audience at the event asked how they could trace their ancestors’ origins through the Children’s Aid Society. Clarke offered to provide insights if people would email him through the Ocean City Library and include as much information as possible, especially country of birth and birth name since first and last names frequently were changed by the receiving family.
The event featuring Clarke was the kick off to the OC Reads program. Building on the Oct. 20 program and furthering the overall concept of OC Reads, additional events starting Oct. 25 will showcase “All Things Irish” with music and a lecture, a local guest speaker whose father was on the orphan train and a discussion with author Baker Kline. Check www.ocpl.org for details.
To contact Camille Sailer, email csailer@cmcherald.com.
