One hundred sixty years ago on Jan, 22, 1852, a group of ladies from the Martha Washington Society gathered downtown at the Stone Church to address the problem of children who were left alone and homeless because of a cholera epidemic. Led by Rebecca Rouse, whose picture hangs in Beech Brook’s Fenn-Wright Center, these women laid the groundwork for a place that would shelter the city’s “orphaned and destitute children.”
And so, as the Cleveland Orphan Asylum, we opened our doors to 11 children, at first in a temporary house near what is now Progressive Field. By 1855, we had our first permanent structure at the corner of E. 55th Streetand Woodland Avenue, just a stone’s throw from our FamilyDrop-InCenterat the Carl B. Stokes Social Services Mall in Cleveland’s Central Neighborhood.
As the city grew, the number of children needing care continued to grow, and by the 1870s, construction had begun on our second home at E. 50th and St. Clair Avenues. By then other orphanages had opened – Jewish, German Methodist, Catholic – and our name changed to the ClevelandProtestant Orphan Asylum,
In the early 1900s, the search began for a country home outside the industrialized city. In 1916, Jeptha Homer Wade, Jr. and his wife gave a gift of the Beech Brook Farm to the orphanage. A campus of Tudor-style buildings was constructed, and by 1926, we had made the move to our present campus.
Our name changes continued over the years, next to the Cleveland Protestant Children’s Home in the 1950s and then again in 1971 to Beech Brook, marking the official end of the orphanage era. Old dormitory-style cottages were torn down and the three cottages we now have were built.
Since then, we’ve been steadily expanding our programs to keep children in their homes with their families, leading to the wide range of educational and mental health services we have today for nearly 21,000 children each year!
The agency will be celebrating the 160th anniversary throughout the year, including at the Beech Ball on May 12, which has the theme, "Birthday at the Beech."