Presentation Children's Home

The Little Flower orphanage for Catholic children opened at Turton, S.D. in 1924. Eight years later an attic fire raged out of control and destroyed the home. Over the next few years, the more than 60 homeless children were shuttled to makeshift quarters in Aberdeen, Woonsocket, Bridgewater, and Columbus College in Sioux Falls.

Mother M. Raphael McCarthy of the Presentation Sisters then proposed to the city of Sioux Falls that it act as sponsoring agent to obtain federal support for a new orphanage. Funds were supplied by the Works Progress Administration, and the newly constructed building opened in 1940.

For almost three decades voluntary donations enabled the Presentation Sisters to house, clothe, feed, and educate a daily average of 80 boys and girls ranging from 3 to 15 years of age.

Gradually the public policy for caring for homeless children changed from institutional care to foster home placement, and the children's home closed in 1966.