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For my research, I chose to study the orphan train movement of the late 19th and early 20th centuries. I looked at the general effects of this experience on children, and I researched some specific children who rode on these trains. I also looked at these events through the themes of change, poverty, and the home. For many children, this program was the only way to escape the poverty that they had been living in. However, these children were not always treated as members of the family, and some of these families only adopted children to get cheap labor to help work the land. The results of the program ended up being somewhat of a mixed bag, where some children and families were very satisfied with their new lives, while others did not have a good experience with their new families.