San Diego Center for Children

Historical Note

The San Diego Center for Children is San Diego's oldest accredited nonprofit organization serving children and adolescents. It was founded in 1887 as the Women's Home Association and served poor, aged, and destitute women. In 1889 the Women's Home Association formally merged with local philanthropist Bryant Howard's Children's Industrial Home, which served homeless, abused, and delinquent children, many of them orphans. In 1898 the Association changed it's name to the Women and Children's Home.

During the first half of the 20th century, the Women and Children's Home was located in Balboa Park, in a building designed by architect Irving Gill. That building was torn down in 1957, and in 1959 the Children's Home moved to its current site in Kearny Mesa, and the Home's name was changed to the San Diego Center for Children.