We Rode the Orphan Trains Book

I picked up this short history when I took my boys to the library. It was in their section and I liked it because I knew that there was a fictional novel out last year about Orphan Trains (I haven't read it yet, my library hasn't gotten a copy), but I did know something about this history. Between the years of 1854 and 1929, 200,000 American children were sent out from the East to the West for an uncertain future. Abandoned by their families, left to live on the streets, or their immigrant parents unable to care for them, these children, some as young as 18 months, left the cities and were put on trains in the care of agents who then saw them on stages in churches or meeting halls while people looked them over and decided to take them or not. Some of the stories don't end happily, as you can imagine. But some do. These are vingettes of memories from surviving orphan train riders. A lost generation of pioneers. It was a social experiment that has happened periodically in other places as well. Child Migrant workers in Australia, for example, who knew they were English, but sent by Catholic organizations like the Christian Brothers to Australia.

These histories are so important to read and remember.