Recently, I completed a book on the history of Camp Hollis, the children’s residential camp in the town of Oswego. In recent years, the children who attend Hollis come from all over Oswego County, but during its early history many were from the two orphanages in the city of Oswego. After learning that the camp once provided respite for children who’d found themselves without a family, I wanted to know more about those orphanages. Shortly before I retired from running the camp, I got my chance when Frank and Craig Fisher paid us a visit.
In 2009, brothers Frank and Craig had stopped at the camp while touring the city that had raised them. In their youth, they and their three siblings were residents of the Oswego Children’s Home. While living there, the Fisher boys spent a few summers as Camp Hollis campers and they stopped by to see the place they fondly remembered.
Frank eventually wrote a book about the Children’s Home, and from it I learned some of its history, including how Oswego originally addressed the needs of parentless children. Four years after the city was founded in 1848, Oswego acknowledged its growing problem of abandoned or homeless children by founding the Oswego Orphan Asylum. According to Frank’s book, “the Asylum was established by an association of ladies of Oswego and incorporated under general law on February 11, 1852…and that the socially prominent made it one of their primary charities.”
Operating out of a rental building on West Sixth Street, the city offered basics like food and shelter, and soon the number of youth being served by the Asylum grew. To accommodate more children, in 1856 it moved to a newly-constructed three-story building on 132 Ellen Street. Seventy-four children were in attendance; a year later, there were 100. Those numbers remained high for decades. (It took many years, but by 1942, the orphanage was given a new name to better reflect its mission: The Oswego Children’s Home.)
The need to care for abandoned children was so critical that a second orphanage opened in Oswego in the 1890s. The Sisters of St. Francis, of Syracuse, New York, had been caring for homeless children from the Oswego area in their convent, but Reverend Michael Barry, Pastor of St. Paul’s Church in Oswego, had long envisioned a home for children in the city where “the little ones could be kept closer to relatives and friends,” rather than being sent to Rochester or Syracuse orphanages. In 1896, the perfect home was found.
It was a three-story estate once owned by Judge Samuel Ludlow. Upon Ludlow’s death, the estate had degenerated into an unseemly “roadhouse” and Oswego residents were gravely concerned about the establishment’s condition. Officials wanted to return the estate to something of value for the community, which is just what happened when it became The Saint Francis Home for Children. Overlooking the Oswego River on the east side of the city, the Home’s mission was “to provide for the care, nurture, maintenance and education of orphaned, homeless and destitute children of all races and creeds.”
There are as many stories of what orphanage life was like as they are children who resided in one. Those stories deserve their own research and recording, but for the purposes of this essay I’ll focus on what the Oswego orphanages provided beyond food, shelter and education. Both Homes featured activities like glee clubs, orchestras and bands, woodshops, sewing rooms and other opportunities to learn life skills. Children attended Sunday church services; the Children’s Home visited different denominations each week, while St. Francis’ Home went to a local Catholic Church. For entertainment, the children marched in the city’s Memorial and Fourth of July parades and were guests for special movie showings and Christmas parties.
How were these orphanages able to manage financially? Budget reports from the city of Oswego’s early history show that its Department of Charity paid for the children’s care. In 1904, a newspaper noted the city allocated $1.50 a week per child to both Homes. Also supporting the orphanages were local service groups like Catholic Daughters and Veteran’s groups. A major financial supporter was the Community Chest, a national charitable organization founded to support a community’s needs. (It later became known as the United Way.) The Community Chest in Oswego, which also helped organizations like the Scouts, 4-H, the Salvation Army and Camp Hollis, annually helped the Oswego Children’s and the St. Francis Children’s Homes.
Today, it’s hard to imagine a time when children without family were raised in an institution. The change came in the 1930s and ‘40s, with a shift in philosophy regarding what was considered best for parentless children. Leading this change locally was Judge Eugene F. Sullivan, the Oswego County Children’s Court Judge who founded Camp Hollis. Sullivan saw many children in his court chamber who had somehow ended up in an orphanage. Along with providing those children with some recreation repose at Camp Hollis, Sullivan also believed that the entire community should take an interest in children who’d had a tough break. He once said, “A vigilant community needs a happy, contented and prepared generation of youngsters to assume their duties of citizenship. All the kids ask is a chance. Let’s see that they get it.”
By the early 1950s, State and Welfare authorities were promoting and encouraging the placement of children in foster homes rather than institutionalized settings. The number of children in the two Oswego orphanages decreased, and by September of 1952, the announcement came that St. Francis’ Home would be closing. The building would carry on its work by serving as the area’s Catholic high school, Bishop Cunningham. Today it is the site of St. Luke’s Nursing Home and the adult residences Bishop Commons and St. Francis Commons.
After celebrating 100 years of service in July of 1952, the Oswego Children’s Home closed its doors in 1956. Oswego State College rented and then purchased the building for use, creating the Hillcrest Dormitory for students. Today, it is the site of a 122-room nursing home facility.
The St. Francis Home for Children, one of two orphanages in the city of Oswego.