The lives of local orphans were never all tragic. Happy memories and great achievements marked some of their lives, often because of the intervention of their extended families or the kindness of people in the community. From the beginnings of…

In May of 1927, at the height of the Prohibition Era, twenty-six year-old Mary Catherine Kamer wed thirty-eight year-old Joseph O’Neill in Jeffersonville. O’Neill had immigrated to Jeffersonville from Ireland where he became the business partner of…

Rather than run a local orphanage, Catholic churches in much of Southern Indiana sent children to large orphanages elsewhere. In America, Catholic, Protestant, and Jewish organizations vied to prevent people from leaving their flocks and to recruit…

Unfortunately, some Clark County orphans ended up serving time in the the Indiana State Reformatory South, among them Belle Moore’s brother William Frank “Polk” Moore. Belle was a fiery, original individual who captured the interest of reporters…

Belle Moore is an example of the incomplete, often contradictory evidence available about orphan’s lives. Born in 1867, Belle may have been surrendered sometime around 1875 by her biological mother, Sallie Crum Moore, a Jeffersonville native, due to…

While most people think of orphans as children with no parents, most orphaned children had one or more living parents. The events that left children with in the custody of the orphanage included diseases and accidents that killed or disabled older…

The original Jeffersonville Orphan’s Home stood near the Ohio River. An apartment building now stands on the area once occupied by the home. Lewis C. Baird's History of Clark County records that the Jeffersonville Orphan Home was founded in 1876,…