Philadelphia Society to Protect Children (Pa.).

The Pennsylvania Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children was organized in November 1876 and chartered in January 1877 as the eighth such group in the United States. The first objective of the new society was to secure passage of a state law allowing for active prosecution in cases of child abuse. This was achieved after more than a year of work. The Society then had two alternatives in proven cases of child abuse: either disciplining the parents and returning their child to them or placing the child in a foster home. Various homes in the city were used for the temporary placement of children pending a decision on their cases. Gradually, the Society's agents conducted more detailed investigations of the cases, and it is the results of these investigations, the case records, that form the bulk of the collection.

Beginning in 1882, the Society worked with the Children's Aid Society in the Child Placement Service. It also tried to educate the public and pushed for a variety of early child labor laws. In 1890, the Society moved to new quarters at 217 South Broad Street where it was able to provide its own temporary quarters for children. By 1906 the SPCC had moved to 415 South Fifteenth Street. These temporary facilities became essential in 1913 when the Juvenile Court was established. Children waited at the Society for their cases to be presented in court and sometimes returned there if the Society was awarded custody of the child.

In 1911, the Society's offices expanded and combined with those of the Children's Aid Society and the Seybert Institution which then helped operate the shelter. In the 1920s, the Children's Aid Society gradually stopped placing the Society's children, and in turn established its own placement service. A branch office opened in Pottsville, Pennsylvania in 1922 but closed in 1940 due to lack of funds. From 1923 to 1942 the Society operated a cottage at Cape May Point, New Jersey which had been donated by John Wanamaker to give the children summer vacations. In 1964 a new foster home program began for children under four, and the baby nurseries in the shelter were closed. The Society was supported entirely by voluntary contributions until 1958 when the City of Philadelphia began to appropriate funds for the care of the children. The city's Department of Public Welfare gradually began to take over more of the Society's Protective Service. During the 1960s, the Society worked with various organizations to investigate the causes and prevention of child neglect and was active in the region's child welfare programs. The Society changed its name to the Philadelphia Society to Protect Children in 1963. Services to Parents and Children began in 1968 as the Society added group services to its existing casework program in order to focus attention on neglectful communities and on neglectful parents.

In 1980, the Philadelphia Society to Protect Children merged with the Inter-Church Child Care Society to form the Philadelphia Society for Services to Children.

From the description of Records, 1876-1970. (Temple University Libraries). WorldCat record id: 122635463