During the years from 1854 to 1929, the Children’s Aid Society, founded by Charles Loring Brace, sent more than 100,000 children on orphan trains from the slums of New York City to new homes in the West. This placing-out program was so successful that other groups, such as the New York Foundling Hospital, followed the example.
The Orphan Train Quartet follows the story of the six Kelly children, whose widowed mother has sent them west from New York City in 1856 because she realizes she cannot give them the life they deserve.