Childhelp history

More than a decade later, President Richard Nixon signed the Child Abuse Prevention and Treatment Act in 1974.

Sara and Yvonne are awarded the Torch 1975, Inc.

In that time, CAPTA was amended with the Adoption Opportunities Program in 1978, and the Indian Child Welfare Act was enacted in 1978 as well.

The first National Child Abuse Prevention Month was in 1979.

Later that year, President Carter signed into law the 1980 Adoption Assistance and Child Welfare Act, laying the groundwork for a focus on permanency and family preservation, which remain important priorities of the child welfare system today.

The year is 1982 and although child abuse had received some media and political attention already, Sara O’Meara and Yvonne Fedderson were determined to continue the fight against child abuse.

Then in 1983, President Reagan proclaimed April as National Child Abuse Prevention Month.

Toward the end of the decade, the success of National Child Abuse Prevention Month helped inspire the first National Foster Care Month too: May, 1988.

Due to the success of the hotline, the Childhelp National Child Abuse Hotline expands in 1990, adding a computerized telephone system capable of handling up to 5 million calls a year!

A few years later, in 1993, Childhelp opened Alice C. Tyler Village of Childhelp East in Lignum, Virginia, to provide services similar to those offered in its Beaumont village in California.

In 1994, an initial cooperation with the Dutch Liliane Foundation was set up with a budget line for Belgium to share its expertise in medical care with the Global South.

President Clinton proclaimed November, 1995, as the first National Adoption Month, an observance that is recognized to this day.

In order to give the IF projects the necessary funding boost, Pierre Mertens and Lieven Bauwens (former IF director) founded Child-Help Belgium out of IF in 2006 with a branch in Tanzania.

In 2008, Prevent Child Abuse America introduced the blue pinwheel as a symbol for child abuse prevention.

In 2009, its 50th anniversary year, Childhelp sponsored a national “End Child Abuse Now” bus tour.

By April of 2010, each governor of all 50 states had signed the historic document committing themselves and their states to do everything in their power to eliminate child abuse.

In addition to Child-Help Belgium, in 2014 Child-Help was established in Italy and the Netherlands.

Then in 2016, the Childhelp National Child Abuse Hotline opens a second office in Washington D.C. as the hotline expands texting services.

Childhelp Alice C. Tyler Village is named “2017 Nonprofit of the year” by the Culpeper County Chamber of Commerce.

With the help of an innovation grant from the Department of Health and Human Services in 2018 the Childhelp National Child Abuse Hotline was able to pilot expanded hotline services to include text and online chat.