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WigginObject number: 13108.14
Gallery: Public Spaces
Object Name: photograph
Title: Wiggin's Orphan Asylum, 243 - 247 St. James Street, Saint John, New Brunswick
Artist: Augustus Stoerger
Date: 1883
Medium: albumen print, mounted on card
Dimensions: overall: 12.5 x 10.1 cm
Credit Line: Gift of Arthur Gordon Leavitt, 1929
Notes: This institution was founded and endowed by Stephen Wiggins, a prominent Saint John merchant. It was established to care for male orphan and destitute male fatherless children born in Saint John County. In 1895, the home’s sphere extended to the entire province. The Wiggins Male Orphan Institution was incorporated in 1867 and opened in 1876. The institution was located on St. James St. in Saint John South and was severely damaged during the Great Fire in 1877. It was rebuilt on the same site. The Wiggins Male Orphan Institution moved to Mount Pleasant Avenue in 1922, remaining there until a new home on Hawthorne Avenue (north Saint John) was constructed in 1965. The Wiggins Male Orphan Institution later became known as the Stephen Wiggins Home for Boys: it closed in 1982.


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