User blog comment:AGrimAuxiliatrix1/"The Orphanage"- 1960's Chicago Primary Sources/@comment-26011836-20150620191447/@comment-26054278-20150711032644

Here's a quote about the type of orphanage I'll be portraying (which can be found here):

''Conditions varied, but tended not to be good. Many orphanages were highly regimented, especially early in the century. Children marched to meals, which they ate in silence. They wore uniforms and sometimes had their heads shaved. Corporal punishment was common, with inmates routinely beaten across the hands with leather straps. The diet tended to be poor. Says Crenson, "Inmates, as adults, recalled that they were hungry all the time." He found accounts of the kids in a Cleveland orphanage breaking out to raid a nearby bakery; he came across another story about Jewish kids saying kaddish for their orphanage's wretched cook--in the hope that she would die.''

''Orphanages often were dangerous. The mortality rate was not much better than on the streets. Older, bigger, tougher kids preyed mercilessly on younger, smaller inmates. Says Crenson, "As hard as it was to leave kids at the mercy of some adults, it was much worse to leave them at the mercy of 100 kids. Living in an orphanage meant either being a predator or a victim." He found accounts of older boys sodomizing younger ones. There were institutions that were well-run by compassionate people, but in general an inmate's life was a tough one.''