The Railroads of the Orphan Train
If you look at the map of orphan train riders, you can see that just about every county in the state was touched by the orphan train...
1883 Orphan Train Rider Report
The 1883 holds a few clues as to the identity of many orphans, but not many could be confirmed in the census records. The farmer who...
George & Paul Sambuc, Orphan Train Rider
George Sambuc (1870 - ?) wrote in his letter of 1895 from Piper City, IL that although his brother Paul had a successful farm in North...
Lena & Thomas Church, McHenry County
Lena and Thomas Church came to the small community called Terra Cotta in McHenry County in 1893, the year of the White City World's Fair....
Elizabeth Peeling, Orphan Train Rider
Elizabeth Peeling (1879 - ) was one of the children sent to the town of Odell in 1889. She appeared in the census in 1880 as the daughter...
John Griffith, Orphan Train Rider
John Griffith (1879 - 1936) came to Illinois in 1889 and settled in Odell, Livingston County. This could be the town with the most...
Edward Luckert, Madison County
Edward Luckert came to Illinois at the age of 16 in 1883. He is probably the same Edward Luckert who was listed in the 1880 census with...
Arthur & Annie Wycoff, Orphan Train Riders
Arthur (1860 - 1933) and Annie Wycoff (1860 - 1937) rode the orphan train to Macon County in 1873. In 1880 they both appeared with the...
Emilio Ferrio, Montgomery County
Emilio Ferrio came to the United States in 1867 and emigrated to Illinois in 1869. In the Chicago Tribune, he claimed to have been sent...
George, Adelaide & Maude McAndrews, Orphan Train Riders
George McAndrews was sent West in 1886 and was born in about 1876. The 1900 census found him on the Pennell farm, working for Everett and...
