Fargo Orphanages Home to Many

From 1845 through 1920 the Children’s Aid Society of New York City transported about 2 million orphaned children by railroad from New York and Boston. The society was founded by Charles Long Brace who believed that “placing out” the tens of thousands of homeless children to small towns and farms, most often to the Midwest, was far better than living on the streets of a large city. The cars carrying the children were called “Orphan Trains.” Some of them came to Fargo.
[snip]
Fargo’s other children’s home was St. John’s Orphanage. Its first building was a frame structure completed in 1897 at 808 7th Ave. N. In 1907 the building was destroyed by fire and a three-story brick structure was erected.

The orphanage was founded by Mother Mary Agnes Hughes of the Order of the Presentation of the Blessed Virgin Mary. From 1897 to 1928 the sisters traveled throughout North Dakota, other Midwestern states and occasionally to the east and west coasts raising funds for the orphanage. Fargo In-Forum