Annie Fleischman

The Home’s records reveal nothing of the circumstances that led to the admission of 10-year-old Annie Fleischman from Memphis, Tennessee in October 1911. More is known of the circumstances that apparently prompted her discharge two years later. In January 1913, the newspapers described “Annie Fleshman {sic]” as “the pretty little girl who ran away” from the Home. A day later, the police reportedly found her safe and sound in the nearby home of “some Jewish people.”

When asked to explain why she had left the Home, the press reported that “she only smiles and says she had no reason; but, then, she likes adventure.” 

Although grateful for the girl’s return, for which it expressed thanks to Police Commissioner Harold Newman, the board was less sanguine about Annie’s thirst for adventure. At its February 2 meeting, the board voted to discharge Annie and by March 2, Superintendent Leon Volmer had returned from Memphis where he delivered Annie into the “charge and keeping of the authorities by whom she had been admitted to this Home.”