I will be investigating the Leake and Watts Orphan House from 1843-1890, when it was located at 112th St. and Amsterdam, the current location of St. John the Divine. It was founded by John Watts in 1831 with money left by his brother-in-law John Leake, who had died in 1827 ‘having experienced the sadness of knowing that, of all the scattered millions on Earth, not one existing was bound to him by ties of consanguinity’, to quote Rev. J.F. Richmond’s 1872 ‘New York and Its Institutions’. (http://clio.cul.columbia.edu:7018/vwebv/holdingsInfo?bibId=6182272)
John Leake had bequeathed his estate to Robert Watts, the third son of John Watts, on the condition that he change his name to Leake; if not, the money would go to establish an orphan asylum, open to children regardless of nationality or religion. Robert died while in the process of changing his name (he caught a fever while playing baseball) and John Watts undertook to set up the asylum. It was originally downtown, but moved to Morningside Heights in 1843; it sold the Morningside property in 1888 to St. John the Divine, and, in 1891, moved to Yonkers, where it still exists. (http://www.leakeandwatts.org/)
