Thomas John Barnardo

British social worker

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Thomas John Barnardo (born July 4, 1845, Dublin, Ire.—died Sept. 19, 1905, Surbiton, Surrey, Eng.) was a pioneer in social work who founded more than 90 homes for destitute children. Under his direction, the children were given care and instruction of high quality despite the then unusual policy of unlimited admittance.

Barnardo’s father, of an exiled Spanish Protestant family, emigrated from Hamburg, Ger., to Ireland. Barnardo himself went to London in 1866 to train as a Protestant medical missionary to China. While studying medicine he became superintendent of a “ragged school” (free school for poor children) in the East End of London, where, in 1867, he founded a juvenile mission. The first of “Dr. Barnardo’s homes” for destitute boys was founded in 1870 and his first home for girls in 1876. The homes were chartered in 1899 as the National Incorporated Association for the Reclamation of Destitute Waif Children.

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Thomas John Barnardo

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