April 2014--Orphan Trains: The Story of Charles Loring Brace & the Children He Saved & Failed

I'm so sorry. I should have put this up weeks ago, but real life has been going at a blistering pace and I've hardly had time to cuss a cat (but I MAKE time to read every night--at least an hour. Wish it was more...).

So this is what we decided to read for April, and as per usual, maybe start discussing the second Monday, April 14?

If you all want to keep doing this, I mean. I don't mean to force anyone....

:)

Oh, yes, I want to continue. But I'm right there with you when it comes to real life being crazy. I haven't had a day at home to do anything in at least 2 months. I haven't even read much lately. And I forgot where I was planning to get this book from since my usual library doesn't have it. I still have the February book sitting on my night stand with a bookmark on about page 30. What have I been doing all this time?!

Thanks for the reminder, Terri. Our group is small but I'd like to continue with it. Maybe we will grow with time. I reserved a copy from MOBIUS and look forward to reading it.

I just started my book last night, so maybe we should move the discussion date ahead a week? Or two?

I also enjoy the group and would hate to see it end. So we'll carry on!

I also just started the book and would be in favor of moving back the discussion at least a few days.

I vote for a discussion later in the month. My copy is waiting for me at the library. I want to continue with the group even if only a few of us participate. I like the idea of reading books with a Missouri connection and might not do it if I weren't accountable to even a small group.

Well I'm nearly half way through with the book. The first section was tedious, but I'm enjoying the second section much more. I just finished the other book I was reading at the same time and will now be able to focus solely on this one. Hope to have it finished before Monday. How is everyone else coming?

How does it compare to the other orphan train book we read? I lost track of when/what we were reading, not that I've had much time to read lately anyway.

I just finished the book and have mixed feelings about it. Is it OK to go ahead and leave comments?

I hope so, Sandy, because I'm going to. I thought the stories were very interesting, and it was much more in depth than the book we read earlier (though it wasn't much about Missouri). However, I got very irritated at some of the assumptions that the author made. A lot of the things he blamed on Brace would look very bad today, but they were common for the times. Parents beat their children frequently, and I don't think you can pull a couple of stories out and call them definitive proof. I'm not saying it's a good thing, mind you, but I felt like the author was looking for bad things. Once in a while he seemed to give some credit, but mostly he made out like the whole orphan train thing was a disaster. It certainly had its issues, but I think it worked for the times.

Terri, I think you're right about the author seeming to look for reasons to blame Brace for the things he'd done. That whole section about the changing definitions of "success" in relation to the outcomes of orphan or foster children was confusing. He seemed to be saying that those cases that were labelled "fail" either at the time or in the survey done later (1940's or 1950's?) would be considered "success" today, and visa versa. I followed his arguments, and think it's an important point. I wish he'd expanded it, though, into a more detailed discussion. Maybe it deserved a chapter of its own.

My primary complaint about the whole book - besides the fact that there was little in there specifically about Missouri - was that he didn't seem to have a clear goal in mind. I was never sure whether he was in favor of or opposed to the whole orphan train business. I thought the sub-title of the book was misleading, as it really wasn't specifically about Brace and his actions (except for the first couple of chapters). He gave examples of both good and bad situations that children found themselves in after going west, but never tried to explain whether those situations were common or extraordinary. And I don't remember that he even mentioned the children who didn't ride the trains - what happened to the kids who stayed behind?

I was interested in his repeated emphasis on examples of even very young children being turned loose to find their way and given unthinkable (to us) amounts of freedom and responsibility for their own welfare. I would have liked this topic to have been better organized, again perhaps into a chapter of its own.

The last chapter, about the current state of child welfare efforts, annoyed me at first. I thought the book was supposed to be only an historical look at the subject and his opinions about the current situation didn't really interest me. However, I ended up liking that chapter best simply because it was the most focused. It was obvious that he had a clear idea of how he felt about that subject, and it came through in his writing. In contrast to the rest of the book.

Going back to your comments about the very young children being turned loose, that brought to mind King of the Hill: A Memoir by A. E. Hotchner that we read a while back. He had parents, but he was left alone, and it seemed to be fairly conventional for those times. So I think it would have been easy for him to expand on that. I think it was just an unsatisfying book for me. Not awful, but nothing that would make me want to pick up anything else he had written.

That's a good point, Terri, about the kids being left alone that we read about in the Hotchner book. It makes me wonder what has caused society to do a 180 degree change in 100 years - to the point now where kids aren't even allowed to go outside and play in their own neighborhoods or walk to school.

And I agree - not much interest in reading anything else he's written. Although, I would still be interested in another book about the orphan trains. That subject still fascinates.