ABSTRACT
A considerable number of men and women on Relief had been born into large families. About one-third of the men came from families of seven or more children and another third came from families of four to six children. The men and women who had been brought up in large families did not think their childhoods exceptional, for they recalled that in the old days large families had been typical. In many families, especially in those with a large number of children, economic conditions had been strained. Because of the economic plight of their families many children had to leave school and go to work before they had completed grammar school, not to mention high school. Several Jewish families left Europe because they feared for their lives even more than for their pocketbooks. Many foreign-born Catholic women, in order to supplement their families' meager incomes, were placed in service in early adolescence.
