Abandoned Baby Smiles in Crib at N.Y. Foundling Hospital…

Our police Headquarters man, an experienced photographer of the down and out, took this picture last week at the New York Foundling Hospital. “This one foundling,” he reported, “that really laughed for me without being tickled under the chin.” The baby had been abandoned by his mother in a rooming house at 309 W. 48th St. She paid $1 deposit on a room, put the baby in it and left, after telling the caretaker she was going to a bus station to pick up her bags. Early next morning the caretaker found the child, alone and crying, and turned him over to the police who promptly took him to the hospital. In our picture, taken 3 hours later, the infant is wearing under his hospital gown, the white undershirt and long, white stockings in which he was discovered. A bottle and a nap have restored his good humor. Attendants, remarking “what a pretty baby,” guess he was seven months old.”
PM Daily, November 15, 1942, p. 10