J.J. Kelso (right), founder of the Children’s Aid Society, with W.H. Wightmyer and some of the children, Belleville, Ontario, 1910, by an unknown photographer

Canada’s leading advocate for child welfare reform in the last two decades of the nineteenth century, J.J. Kelso (1864-1935) was only 24 years of age when he established the Toronto Humane Society to promote the social causes of child and animal welfare.

He was instrumental in the creation of the Fresh Air and Santa Claus funds in 1888, and finally the Children’s Aid Society in 1891. Kelso also promoted the rights of young offenders, proposing their rehabilitation from institutional detention and the separation of juveniles from adult court and prisons.

Many of his photographic images include the children that he fought so hard to help.

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