New York Catholic Protectory

The New York Catholic Protectory, officially known as the Society for the Protection of Destitute Roman Catholic Children in the City of New York, was a Catholic orphanage in the Bronx, New York City, founded in 1863. At one time, it was the largest child welfare organization in the country. It received official state recognition in 1871 and closed in 1938.

By the mid 1860s, many children in New York City were the offspring of immigrants living in squalid and disease-ridden neighborhoods. Adding to the destitution was the fact that casualties of the Civil War left many women widows and their children fatherless.^[1] "The Society for the Protection of Destitute Roman Catholic Children in the City of New York was chartered in 1863.

The former Episcopal Bishop of North Carolina, the Catholic convert Levi Silliman Ives, was the founder and first president of the Catholic Protectory.^[2] It began with two buildings on 36th and 37th Streets in Manhattan, for boys under the care of the Christian Brothers, a congregation founded in France, in the first quarter of the eighteenth century, by St. John Baptiste de la Salle for the training and correction of wayward youth.^[3] Many of the boys received had been adjudicated truants. The Boys Department subsequently relocated to 86th Street and Fifth Ave.

In October 1863, a building at the corner of 86th Street and Second Avenue was secured for girls and placed under the direction of the Sisters of Charity. This proving too small, a forty-acre farm was purchased in Westchester and a new building erected in 1859. When that building burned in 1872, the older girls were instructed to each escort a younger one and all escaped injury. Along with religious instruction and an elementary school education in common subjects, many girls were taught trades and often given the opportunity to work outside the school in favorable conditions. Those who showed either interest or aptitude received lessons in music, art, or crafts from the sisters.^[3]

In 1865 the Protectory purchased the William Varian 114 acre farm in Westchester near St. Raymond's Church. A school and dormitories were built. The institution was an integral part of the parish until it was sold in 1938.^[4] Besides orphans placed there by the Charity Commission, and juvenile delinquents placed by the courts, the Protectory also accepted children placed there by parents or guardians unable to adequately provide for them. In 1871, the Protectory was recognized officially by the state legislature.^[5]

By 1878, the Protectory was serving over 3,000 children annually. According to Janet Butler Munch, "It effectively served as a safety net for children and families in need. The goal was not long-term commitments for children but return to their families when conditions stabilized.^[1]

The sisters took care of all the girls, and any boys under ten years of age; the brothers had charge of the older boys. Unlike many similar institutions, the Protectory provided training in skills that would allow its charges to make a living upon leaving. It was felt that vocational studies should not be postponed until mature years, but should be commenced early, so as to accustom the boy to what may afterwards prove to be the means of earning his own livelihood when he shall have left the Protectory. The boys learned printing in all its branches, photography, tailoring, shoemaking, laundry work, industrial and ornamental drawing, sign-painting, blacksmithing, plumbing, carpentry, bricklaying, stone-work, baking in its different branches, and in practical knowledge of boilers, engines, dynamos and electric wiring.^[6] The girls learned to embroider, cook and make gloves, typewriting, and stenography.

The students in the occupational training classes were paid, given individual accounts, and encouraged to save their earnings. Graduates of the Printing House found work at New York newspapers as compositors and pressmen. All clothing was made on site in the Tailoring Department. According to Munch, "The boys handled all maintenance work on the property including painting, carpentry, masonry, bricklaying, and electrical work."^[1] The boys from different trades would make up sports teams to compete with one another. In 1904, Protectory Band played “Garry Owen” at Theodore Roosevelt's presidential inauguration in Washington.

In 1920, the Lincoln Giants, a professional Negro league baseball team from Harlem moved from their old home park, Olympic Field (at Fifth Avenue and 136th Street), to the Catholic Protectory Oval in the Bronx.

The Protectory closed in 1938.^[5]