Learn about a highly-praised orphanage founded for the children of Ohio veterans who died in service, at the Lucy House June 27th.

The Friends of the Lucy Hayes Heritage Center will hold their annual meeting at noon Saturday, June 27th, at the birthplace of Chillicothe’s First Lady at 90 West Sixth Street. After the business meeting, Bill Chavanne will speak on the institution that raised him.

Lucy Hayes and Ohio Governor and U.S. President Rutherford B. Hayes were involved in founding the nearly 500-acre orphanage near Xenia: “The Ohio Soldiers and Sailors Home came into its remarkable life during the 1870s, a moral response to the debt owed Ohio families damaged and destroyed by their fealty to the great national struggle just ended – the American Civil War.”

Weather permitting, the meeting, presentation, and refreshments will be held outside in the Lucy House gardens to allow social distancing.  It is free and open to the public.

Bill Chavanne has served in Ohio government and promotes the story of the orphanage that raised him, including the 2010 book “A Home of Their Own: The Story of Ohio’s Greatest Orphanage” by Edward R. Lentz.

A 16-minute DVD is also available: “The story of one of the grandest, most successful social experiments of the nineteenth century. In its long and vital history, the orphanage was a lifeline for over 13,500 homeless and endangered children.”