Rotary Club Meeting – 2-20-24
Rotarian Peter Strawitz invited Martha Aubert and James Douget from the Louisiana Orphan Train Museum to present the program at the Rotary meeting on Tuesday. The Louisiana Orphan Train Museum will be celebrating 15 years in October. This museum is 100% volunteer run, and there are approximately 2000 visitors per year. They do a lot of community outreach as well.
In the mid-1800s, there was a huge influx of people to New York, and due to shortages, there were thousands of street children, possibly as many as 30,000. Sister Irene Fitzgibbons founded the New York Foundling Hospital. She got the Catholic Church involved, and they were able to send children, as many as 350,000, all over the country. Most of them taken in as indentured servants, but they became a part of the families and part of the local communities. The Church sent people to check on the welfare of the children. Many people in this area can trace their roots back to the Or
Rotary Club Meeting – 2-20-24
Rotarian Peter Strawitz invited Martha Aubert and James Douget from the Louisiana Orphan Train Museum to present the program at the Rotary meeting on Tuesday. The .
Learn more about a fascinating time in Louisiana history on Jan. 27 when Martha Aubert, president of the Louisiana Orphan Train Museum in Opelousas, and James Douget, a museum board