Can you give me information on the Suemma Coleman Home located in Indianapolis Indiana?

Answer 1

The adoption agency was established and licensed in 1894. It was sponsored by the Women's Christian Temperance Union and William C. Wheeler of the William Mission Ministries. Its mission was to provide wayward girls with seclusion, shelter, medical assistance as well as supervised moral reform. These girls and women shared space with the vagrants and alcoholics of the time. This did not work out very well. It became the Door of Hope in 1896. It changed its name to the Indiana Door of Hope Rescue Home in 1910. In 1912, it became associaled with the Florence Crittendon Homes of Indiana. In 1935, when the Crittendon Homes stopped offering mothers the choice of adoption, it became the Suemma Home for Unwed Mothers. Their services served primarily young women from Protestant homes. The mission's objectives altered because of changes in medicine and society. Local hospitals began delivering babies so that mothers could stay at home instead of the maternity home. The maternity home shut its doors in 1975. The Suemma Coleman Home for Unwed Mothers became known as Coleman Adoption Services. In 2004, they merged with St. Elizabeth to become known as St. Elizabeth Coleman.