Orphan Train / 1979

A dedicated social worker organizes a train trip for a group of slum orphans in 1894, taking them from New York City to the Midwest in search of new families and new lives.

Orphan Train

West by Orphan Train / 2014

It seems incomprehensible that there was a time in America's not-so-distant past when nearly a quarter of a million children from East Coast orphanages were loaded on trains and sent west, where they were presented "for the picking." West by Orphan Train will tell the story of these children, who were taken from a sometimes-rough existence to an unfamiliar rural setting during an era that lasted from 1854 to 1929. As some of the last of the still-living orphan train riders like to remind us, it was a different era - one that can't be judged without understanding what lives were like then. West by Orphan Train, a documentary film completed late in 2014, offers that understanding.

Hostile Territory / 2022

Former P.O.W. Jack Calgrove moves Heaven and Earth to be reunited with his children following the Civil War. After returning home, Jack discovers that his wife has tragically died and his children, presumed to be orphans, are heading deep into the West on a train crossing enemy lines, with the intent of being placed into new homes. Calgrove and another soldier team up with a troop of Native American sharpshooters and a freed slave as they try to stop the train.