author
Charles Loring Brace
1826–1890
A pioneering reformer in 19th-century New York, he founded the Children's Aid Society and became best known for launching the Orphan Train movement. His work helped shape early ideas about child welfare and foster care in the United States.
1 Audiobook
The Dangerous Classes of New York, and Twenty Years' Work Among Them
by Charles Loring Brace
About the author
Born on June 19, 1826, Charles Loring Brace was an American minister, writer, and social reformer who became one of the best-known child welfare advocates of his era. He studied at Yale and later turned his attention to the poverty and homelessness he saw among children in New York City.
In 1853, he founded the Children's Aid Society, an organization created to help poor and abandoned children through schooling, lodging, and practical support. He is most closely associated with the Orphan Train movement, which aimed to place children from crowded city institutions into homes in rural communities.
Brace died on August 11, 1890. His legacy remains important but also complex: he is often described as a father of modern foster care, while the large-scale child-placement efforts he inspired are also remembered as part of a difficult and debated chapter in American social history.