Guide to the Family Service of Greater Boston records, 1839-1992

Descriptive Summary

Creator Family Service of Greater Boston (Boston, Mass.)
Title Family Service of Greater Boston records
Dates 1839-1992
Identification CC 7
Quantity 1.25 linear feet (3 manuscript boxes)
Collection Abstract The records of the Family Service of Greater Boston (FSGB) include the records of its predecessors and other organizations absorbed by the FSGB. The organizations documented include the Associated Charities of Boston; Provident Association; Family Society of Greater Boston; Industrial Aid Society for the Prevention of Pauperism; and Boston Society for the Prevention of Pauperism. This collection records the effort of the FSBGB to prevent pauperism in the early 19th century, the local impact of the charity organization movement, the trend to provide volunteer counseling rather than financial aid to the poor, and later the increasing use of trained social workers to provide a great variety of services to a broad group in the community. The records include annual reports with statistics on families aided, financial statements, objectives, and activities; constitutions and by-laws; bulletins including case histories; manuals which include rules for paid and volunteer workers and agency policies; correspondence which includes referrals to and from the Associated Charities of Boston; and pamphlets whose authors include Robert Winthrop, Robert Treat Paine; and Octavia Hill. The collection also contains bound materials including constitutions, rules, essays, speeches, pamphlets, and annual reports.
Historical Abstract The Family Service of Greater Boston is an organization that arose out of the combination of a variety of charitable organizations from within Massachusetts. These charities, some of which date back to 1657, were focused on aiding their own and providing help and support for particular ethnic or religious groups. These various charities were eventually absorbed into the Family Service of Greater Boston, which provides intensive family-based services, services to pregnant women, and parenting women and their children, elder services, mental health and substance abuse services, and services for the business community. The latter program includes a workplace solutions department providing a full range of employee assistance to organizations and their employees. They also offer a corporate elder care program for employees who are concerned about caring for elder relatives.
Language Material in English.
Location Collection may be stored offsite. Please contact Archives staff for more information.

Information for Users

Access Restrictions

Collection is open.

Copyright Notice

Copyright for materials resides with the creators of the items in question, unless otherwise designated.

Publishing Permission

Please contact the College Archivist with requests to publish any material from the collection.

Preferred Citation

[Identification of item: description and date], Family Service of Greater Boston records, CC 7, Simmons College Archives, Boston, MA, USA.

Acquisitions Information

Gift of Donald Moreland, 1988, 1989. Transferred from the Simmons College School of Social Work Library, 1991

Accession number: 88.012, 93.032

Processing Information

Processed by Richard S. Carroll, June 1994

Supervised by Peter Carini and Megan Sniffin-Marinoff

This collection guide was encoded as part of the LEADS project by Meghan Poepping, August 2012


Organizational History

Early Charity History in Massachusetts

Five charitable societies were organized in Massachusetts before the American Revolution: the Scots Charitable Society (1657), the Boston Episcopal Society (1724), the Charitable Irish Association (1737), the Boston Marine Society (1742), and the Massachusetts Charitable Society (1762). Shortly after the Revolution, five other charities were established: The Humane Society of Massachusetts (1785), the Massachusetts Congregational Charitable Association,(1786), the Massachusetts Charitable Fire Society (1792), the Massachusetts Charitable Mechanics Society (1795), and the Roxbury Charitable Society (1795).

These early charities were cooperatives, taking care of their own and providing--from their limited resources--help to their particular ethnic or religious group, or to members of their own guild. (1)

Charity Work in the 19th and 20th Centuries

In the 19th century, the cooperative spirit of the early charities waned. The new relationship of the charitable agency was of the rich to the poor (regardless of background), and the poor were recognized as a permanent group within the community. A second trend was to provide counseling rather than relief grants to the needy.

In the 1830's, Joseph Tuckerman, a Unitarian clergyman, began to work as a city minister among the Boston poor. His concept of charity came from Thomas Chalmers, a Scottish rector who had transformed his own parish in Glasgow by strict adherence to a standard of self-help. Tuckerman advocated three principles of charity: "the abolition of outdoor relief, the organization of the forces of charity, and personal visitation to the poor -- forty years before they were generally applied by charity societies."(2)

In 1834, Tuckerman convened an Association of Delegates from the Benevolent Societies of Boston. Their endorsement of his principles began a new era for Boston philanthropy.

The histories of the Boston Society for the Prevention of Pauperism (founded by Tuckerman), the Boston Provident Association, and the Associated Charities (whose records form the basis of this collection) are interconnected and difficult to trace. Shown below is a time line deconstructing their genealogies:

1835 - Tuckerman founded the Boston Society for the Prevention of Pauperism.
1851 - The Boston Provident Association separately founded.
1871 - The Society for the Prevention of Pauperism changed its name to the Industrial Aid Society for the Prevention of Pauperism.
1879 - The Associated Charities of Boston founded.
circa 1910 - Boston Provident and Associated Charities (both family agencies) took over and reorganized the Industrial Aid Society, also setting up a Joint Department for Homeless Men.
1922 - The Associated Charities became the Family Welfare Society of Boston.
1942 - The Family Welfare Society of Boston became the Family Society of Greater Boston.
1951 - The Family Society of Greater Boston became the Family Service of Greater Boston.
1953 - The Family Service absorbed the Provident Association, thus bring together three important predecessors from the 19th century.

Objectives (1835-1994)

In the 19th century, an early target of charitable agencies was the problem of pauperism. The term referred to the poor who remained in a state of unnecessary dependence. By contrast, poverty was an occasional matter of temporary misfortune. The two societies for the prevention of pauperism sought to find jobs for both groups--especially for released convicts--and also to find suitable homes for children and widows. They considered their approach preventive as opposed to remedial.

Another problem was the proliferation of the charities themselves--and of people receiving unregulated relief--in Boston. The Provident Association sought to organize the local charities through a central register, and led in constructing a Charity Building (1869) which brought together many agencies under the same roof.

Associated Charities completed the organization of local charities--as the culmination of a charity organization movement imported from England--and also introduced a new concept of "not alms, but a friend" by organizing volunteer visitors to counsel the poor.(3)

This approach clashed with the Provident's procedure of dispensing funds rather than counseling.(4) In fact, both agencies ended up giving material help during the recessions of the 1870's and 1893. In the 1930's, the Permanent Charity Fund also made its largest grants to Provident and Family Welfare (successor to Associated Charities) as "the city's two principal relief agencies."(5)

At present, the Family Service of Greater Boston carries on and expands the activities of its predecessors through: intensive family-based services, services to pregnant women, and parenting women and their children, elder services, mental health and substance abuse services, and services for the business community. The latter program includes a workplace solutions department providing a full range of employee assistance to organizations and their employees. They also offer a corporate elder care program for employees who are concerned about caring for elder relatives.(6)

Why the Name Changes?

The Society for the Prevention of Pauperism probably added the term "Industrial Aid" to clarify its objective of finding jobs for people.

In 1922, when Associated Charities became Family Welfare, the new name reflected the fact that the word "charities" had "latterly come to signify material relief" rather than the service their organization could provide to families needing counseling. Family Welfare also stated that the term "Associated Charities" emphasized "mechanism"--reflecting the charitable organization movement of the mid-nineteenth century--rather than the Society's primary purpose "to promote sound family life."(7)

In the same fashion, the changes of title from "association" and "society" to "service" presumably indicate the different structure of the organizations and later the increasing use of trained social workers to provide a great variety of services.

Notes:
1. For example, the first charity, the Scots Charitable Society, was established after the disastrous Scottish defeat at Dunbar by Cromwell's commonwealth army. Prisoners, both able-bodied and wounded, were sent to the Colonies. In 1652, a ship carrying 272 Scots reached Boston. When continued aid was needed, 27 local Scots signed a compact to pay quarterly fees to the Society as "our benevolence for ourselves being Scottish men and for any of the Scottish Nation whom we may see cause to help." A century later, the Massachusetts Charitable Society represented a transition towards a broader scope of philanthropy. It was the first organization to enroll members without regard to religion, trade, or national origin. This charity was primarily directed to assisting members and their families, but they also reached out to a broader population, and they set precedents by earmarking grants for specific purposes such as educating female orphans or giving "a blanket to each prisoner, indiscriminately, now in Boston gaol." See Katharine D. Hardwick, As Long as Charity Shall be a Virtue: Boston Private Charities 1657-1800, (s.1.: s.n. 1964?) pp. 6 and 15.
2. Nathan I, Huggins, Protestants against Poverty: Boston's Charities 1870-1900 (Westport, CT: Greenwood Publishing, c.1971) p. 17. "Outdoor Relief" referred to any form of welfare relief provided outside an almshouse, orphanage, or other residential facility.
3. Then and Now, a Friend in Need (The Family Welfare Society of Boston, 1929) p.5. Robert Treat Paine (President of the Associated Charities 1879-1907) coined this phrase.
4. Protestants Against Poverty, p. 63.
5. The History of the Boston Foundation 1915-1990, p. 10. The Foundation is the successor to Permanent Charity.
6. Family Service of Greater Boston: Annual Report 1992, s.p.
7. Handbook of Instructions: Family Welfare Society of Boston (192?), p. 5.
8. For further background on the establishment of Associated Charities (now The Family Service of Greater Boston), see Frank D. Watson, The Charity Organization Movement in the United States: A Study in American Philanthropy (New York: Macmillan, 1922) pp. 178-179, 197-201. Other helpful books on charity in the United States include: Priscilla F. Clement, Welfare and the Poor in the Nineteenth - Century City: Philadelphia 1800-1854 (Rutherford, NJ: Fairleigh Dickinson University Press, c1985), and Walter I. Trattner From Poor Law to Welfare State: A History of Social Welfare in America, 2nd ed. (New York: Macmillan, c1979).
9. For a broad study of religious, social, and economic influences on the development of philanthropy in New England, see Conrad E. Wright, The Transformation of Charity in Post-revolutionary New England (Boston: Northeastern University Press, c1992).

Collection Overview

The records of the Family Service of Greater Boston and its predecessors (1835-1992) document successively: (1) the effort to prevent pauperism in the early 19th century, (2) the local impact of the charity organization movement, (3) the trend to provide volunteer counseling rather than financial aid to the poor, and later, (4) the increasing use of trained social workers to provide a great variety of services to a broad group in the community.

The records include annual reports, constitutions and by-laws, bulletins, manuals, correspondence, and miscellaneous pamphlets.

The various names included in the genealogy of the organization were: Associated Charities of Boston; Boston Provident Association; Family Society of Greater Boston/Family Service of Greater Boston; Family Welfare Society of Boston; Industrial Aid Society for the Prevention of Pauperism; and Boston Society for the Prevention of Pauperism.


Online Catalog Headings

These and related materials may be found under the following headings in online catalogs.

Charities -- Massachusetts
Family Service of Greater Boston (Boston, Mass.)
Family services -- Massachusetts
Winthrop, Robert C. (Robert Charles), 1809-1894

Collection Arrangement

Arranged into seven series:

Series I: Annual Reports
Series III: Bulletins
Series IV: Manuals
Series V: Correspondence
Series VII: Bound Documents

Related Material


Detailed Description of the Collection

Abbreviation Key
ACOB = Associated Charities of Boston
BPA = Boston Provident Association
FSOB = Family Society of Boston
FSOGB = Family Service of Greater Boston
FWSOB = Family Welfare Society of Boston
IAS = Industrial Aid Society for the Prevention of Pauperism
SPP = Boston Society for the Prevention of Pauperism
*ACoB= [The] Associated Charities of Boston
AC= Associated Charities
#= Publication number

Series I: Annual Reports (19 folders)

Annual reports cover the period from 1839 through 1992 with numerous gaps, particularly 1854-1869, 1873-1893, 1949-1965 and 1966-1991. Early reports from 1839 to 1854 take the form of an address or discourse, with a few figures on the number of people served. Later reports describe the objectives of the organization and the activities of the central board of directors and district offices. There are statistics on the families aided and often a financial statement. (Reports from 1941 through 1949 were issued also as Bulletins. See Series III.)

Box 1

  • Folder 1: 1839-40, 1846 (SPP); 1852 (BPA); 1854 (SPP)
    • Folder 2: 1869, 1872 (BPA); 1873 (IAS)
      • Folder 3: 1893, 1896-1898 (ACOB)
        • Folder 4: 1900 (BPA); 1901 (ACOB)
          • Folder 5: 1902-1903 (ACOB)
            • Folder 6: 1904-1905 (ACOB)
              • Folder 7: 1906-1907 (ACOB)
                • Folder 8: 1909-1910 (ACOB)
                  • Folder 9: 1911-1913 (BPA)
                    • Folder 10: 1916-1917 (ACOB)
                      • Folder 11: 1919 (ACOB); 1917-1920 (BPA)
                        • Folder 12: 1922 (FWSOB); 1920-1923 (BPA)
                          • Folder 13: 1924-27 (BPA); 1927 (FWSOB)
                            • Folder 14: 1929 (BPA); 1928-1938 (BPA)
                              • Folder 15: 1933, 1935, 1939 (BPA); 1932-1939 (FWSOB)
                                • Folder 16: 1939-1943 (BPA); 1940-1946 (BPA)
                                  • Folder 17: 1940-1945 (FSOB)
                                    • Folder 18: 1946-1949 (FSOBGB)
                                      • Folder 19: 1965 (FSOGB), 1992 (FSOGB)

                                        Series II: Constitution/By-Laws (1 folder)

                                        Editions are available from 1851, 1879, 1886, 1897, 1907, 1908, 1920, and 1938. (The last three editions appear as manuals. See Series IV.)

                                        Box 1

                                        • Folder 20: Constitution/By-Laws
                                          • Constitution and By-Laws (BPA) 1852
                                            • Constitution (ACOB) 1879
                                              • By-Laws (ACOB) 1886
                                                • Charter and By-Laws (ACOB) 1907
                                                  • By-Laws and Act of Incorporation (BPA) 1908
                                                    • By-Laws (BPA) 1920
                                                      • By-Laws (BPA) 1938

                                                        Series III: Bulletins (2 folders)

                                                        Bulletins were issued weekly by the Family Society of Greater Boston from January 3, 1945 to April 25, 1945, and from October 3, 1945 to April 24, 1946. Later bulletins were issued monthly from October 1946 to October 1952 (with gaps) with the general objective of keeping members of the Society posted on the agency's activities. As mentioned above, some were annual reports. Others included case histories, fact sheets, and various items of news.

                                                        Box 1

                                                        • Folder 21: Bulletins 1945-46

                                                          Box 2

                                                          • Folder 1: Bulletins 1946-51

                                                            Series IV: Manuals (2 folders)

                                                            Six publications from 1878 through 1938 are variously titled Directory, Manual, or Handbook. The two directories and an early manual provide rules for paid and volunteer workers. The Handbook of Instruction issued in the 1920s gives these rules in more details, with sections also on the organization of the agency (the Family Welfare Society of Boston), agency policies, and relations with other agencies. As mentioned above, the manuals of 1908, 1920, and 1938 contain only constitutions/by-laws, with the exception of 1908, which includes the Act of Incorporation.

                                                            Box 2

                                                            • Folder 2: Directory (BPA) 1878 (Directions for Volunteers, Directory (BPA) 1884 (Directions for Volunteers), Manual (BPA) 1908 (By-Laws), Manual (BPA) 1920 (By-Laws)
                                                              • Folder 3: Handbook (FWSOB) 1922? (Directions for both paid and volunteer workers), Manual (BPA) 1938 (By-Laws)

                                                                Series V: Correspondence (1 folder)

                                                                Correspondence (mainly 1907 to 1911) covers a few referrals to or from the Associated Charities of Boston and various other agencies, business cards, and several bills for lodging or other services.

                                                                Box 2

                                                                • Folder 4: 1907-1911 (ACOB)

                                                                  Series VI: Miscellaneous Pamphlets (5 folders)

                                                                  Important pamphlets include: Robert Winthrop's "Remarks at the Opening of the Bureau of Charity" (1868) in his role as President of the Boston Provident Society; two addresses (in 1879 and 1880) by Robert Treat Paine, President of the Associated Charities of Boston, on "Charity Organization" and "The Work of Voluntary Visitors...among the Poor, Its Limitations, Allies, Number of Workers, Aims"; five essays (1886) by Octavia Hill, a leader in the Charity Organization Movement in Great Britain; "Then and Now a Friend in Need" (1929), a brief 50th anniversary history of the Family Welfare Society; and "Can You Tell Me..?" (1945), a questionnaire to test public awareness of the activities of the Society, and of the general role of social work.

                                                                  Box 2

                                                                  • Folder 5: 1850-1877
                                                                    • Folder 6: 1879-1881
                                                                      • Folder 7: 1884-1910
                                                                        • Folder 8: 1912-1936
                                                                          • Folder 9: 1937-1962

                                                                            Series VII: Bound Documents (1 volume)

                                                                            Bound material, some available elsewhere in the collection, including constitutions, rules, essays, speeches, pamphlets, and annual reports.

                                                                            Box 3

                                                                            • Folder 1: Associated Charities of Boston (ACoB)*, 1879-1901, Publications
                                                                              • ----Form of Constitution and Plan of Work for the ACoB adopted provisionally February 26, 1879
                                                                                • ----Constitution of the ACoB, Adopted by the Society, Tuesday, December 9th 1879
                                                                                  • #2 ACoB, December 1879, Revised Nov. 1882 Rules and Suggestions for Visitors of the Associated Charities
                                                                                    • ----Charity Organization: Address of Robert Treat Paine, Jr. President of the ACoB... March 12, 1879
                                                                                      • #8 ACoB, Feb. 1880 Essays by Octavia Hill [5]
                                                                                        • #14 ACoB, April 17, 1882 Visiting During the Summer: Visiting Families That Became Self-Supporting, Mutual-Benefit Societies
                                                                                          • #16 ACoB, June, 1880 Cost of Funerals
                                                                                            • #17 "Not alms but a friend": The Work of Volunteer Visitors of ACoB Among the Poor... by Robert Treat Paine Jr., President of ACoB...Read September 10, 1880....Appendix. Ward 10, Boston. One Year to July 1, 1880
                                                                                              • #19 ACoB, Feb. 23, 1881 [Report of Ward VIII, read at the General Conference of ACoB, January 10, 1881]
                                                                                                • #20 Printed by ACoB March, 1881 Truant Officers
                                                                                                  • #23 ACoB, March 1881 Rogues, Vagabonds, Idlers
                                                                                                    • #24 Report of the Committee on Industrial Training... May 16th, 1881
                                                                                                      • #26 By-Laws of ACoB Nov. 1881. Amended Nov. '82, '85, '86, '95 and '97
                                                                                                        • #27 Second Annual Report of ACoB. November, 1881.
                                                                                                          • #32 ACoB, May, 1883 How Pauperism Becomes Hereditary
                                                                                                            • #34 ACoB, No. 11 Feb. 15, 1880 Revised March 1883 Hints to a Conference
                                                                                                              • #35 Fourth Annual Report of ACoB. November, 1883
                                                                                                                • #36 ACoB, December, 1883 Circular to Visitors Concerning Drunkenness
                                                                                                                  • #37 ACoB, February, 1884, Letter from the Executive Committee of the Ward VI Conference To The Directors of ACoB
                                                                                                                    • #38 Fifth Annual Report of the ACoB, November, 1884.
                                                                                                                      • #39 ACoB, April, 1885. The District Conference and Its Executive Committee.
                                                                                                                        • #40 ACoB, April, 1885. Directions For The Work Of An Agent.
                                                                                                                          • #41 ACoB, May, 1885. The Work of The Central Office
                                                                                                                            • #42 Sixth Annual Report of ACoB November, 1885
                                                                                                                              • #43 [Letter of December 21, 1885 from George A. Goddard, Secretary of ACoB, suggesting that first applicants not be sent to the Overseers of the Poor, since private charities can aid new cases.]
                                                                                                                                • #45 Seventh Annual Report of the ACoB November, 1886
                                                                                                                                  • #46 ACoB, October, 1887 A Summary of Decisions of the Board of Directors as to the Conference Business
                                                                                                                                    • #47 Eighth Annual Report of ACoB November, 1886
                                                                                                                                      • ----Associated Charities, A paper read before the Conference of Ward 24 February 1, 1887 [re objects and methods of ACoB]
                                                                                                                                        • #49 Ninth Annual Report of ACoB November, 1888
                                                                                                                                          • #50 ACoB, December, 1888 For Visitors of the AC*
                                                                                                                                            • ACoB, December, 1888, Revised January 1895 For Visitors of the AC*
                                                                                                                                              • #51 Laws applying to Tenements in the City of Boston ACoB, 1889
                                                                                                                                                • #52 Tenth Annual Report of ACoB, November, 1889
                                                                                                                                                  • #53 Eleventh Annual Report of ACoB, November 1890
                                                                                                                                                    • #54 Twelfth Annual Report of ACoB, November 1891
                                                                                                                                                      • #56 Thirteenth Annual Report of ACoB, November 1892
                                                                                                                                                        • #55 ACoB, June, 1892; slightly altered March, 1897 The Committee For The Day, and Voluntary Work Other Than Visiting
                                                                                                                                                          • #57 ACoB, December, 1892 Savings
                                                                                                                                                            • #58 ACoB, April, 1893 [Information pamphlet on ACoB and its work.]
                                                                                                                                                              • #59 Fourteenth Annual Report of ACoB, November, 1893
                                                                                                                                                                • ----How to Relieve Distress Among the Poor this Winter [Unbound 1-column flier listing 17 charities. November 1893]
                                                                                                                                                                  • #60 15th Annual Report of ACoB November, 1894
                                                                                                                                                                    • #61 ACoB, February, 1895 Investigation
                                                                                                                                                                      • #62 16th Annual Report of ACoB, November 1895
                                                                                                                                                                        • #63 Directions for Cooperation
                                                                                                                                                                          • #64 17th Annual Report of ACoB, November, 1896
                                                                                                                                                                            • #65 18th Annual Report of ACoB, November 1897
                                                                                                                                                                              • #67 ACoB Friendly Visiting ... 1897
                                                                                                                                                                                • #68 19th Annual Report of the ACoB November, 1898
                                                                                                                                                                                  • #69 20th Annual Report of the ACoB November, 1899
                                                                                                                                                                                    • #70 ACoB, February, 1900 What is a Friendly Visitor?
                                                                                                                                                                                      • #71 Measures for Improving the Environment... February, 1900
                                                                                                                                                                                        • #72 21st Annual Report of ACoB November, 1900
                                                                                                                                                                                          • ---- Extracts from 21st Annual Report of ACoB
                                                                                                                                                                                            • #74 22nd Annual Report of ACoB November, 1901
                                                                                                                                                                                              • #75 Deserted Wives and Deserting Husbands: A Study of 234 Families, 1901
                                                                                                                                                                                                • #77 ACoB, 23rd Annual Report of the Board of Directors, 1901