The Orphan Trains

In the 1800s, the railroads faced a problem -- farm labor shortages along their newly expanded westward lines threatened profitability. Not surprisingly, in 1853, they jumped at the chance to support a New York City minister's idea--an early version of foster care that would find homes for the city's orphans on farms in the Midwest. Until the program ended in 1929, more than a quarter of a million abandonded, homeless, and orphaned children were taken from the streets, tenements, and orphanages of New York City and sent to uncertain futures with strangers. Production funding provided by the Minnesota Arts & Cultural Heritage Fund and by the members of Prairie Public About the Minnesota Arts and Cultural Heritage Fund In 2008, Minnesota voters passed a landmark piece of legislation — the Minnesota Clean Water, Land, and Legacy Amendment — which provided funding to public television stations serving audiences in Minnesota. Its mission is to help preserve and document the treasures of culture, history, and heritage that make Minnesota special, and to increase access to the natural and cultural resources we all share.