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States and by 1924, the totalwas down to 150,000.
Ellis Island closed in {95^ but became part of the Statue of Liberty National Monument in 1965.
Insufficient living conditions added problems
Port cities were overcrowded for even temporary housing. Tenements often housed ten or more persons to the room. Jobs became scarce and labor was cheap.
Without the extended family (grandparents, aunts, uncles) to rely upon in times of need, young families fell apart. Children as young as six years old were working to help support the family. Food became scarce. Job safety was not a priority causing many men to be killed in accidents at sea and at other work places. This left women and children to make their own way living as best they could.
Diseases from living in unsanitary quarters led to early deaths of overworked mothers. Orphanages were built to care for as many children as could possibly be taken in. Adults could pay for the care on a weekly or monthly basis but if the payments stopped, the child became a ward of the court and was "disposed" of as the social workers saw fit.
Searching for relief
In 1853, Charles Lorring Brace and a group of businessmen formed a new organization to help care for neglected children. They called it the Children's Aid Society of New York City with Mr. Brace as the first Secretary.
In a book, Dangerous Classes and My Twenty Years of Work Among Them, Mr. Brace described
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