Fostering on the Farm: Child Placement in the Rural Midwest, by Megan Birk

Financially helping poverty stricken kids has always been controversial. With conservatives both rooting for more kids to be born and denying them help in the form of early childhood intervention, food stamps (SNAP), or subsidized childcare for those whose parents must work. 

This book is for anyone interested in the origins of today's foster care system. How a society treats its children speaks volumes. In the U.S., we have always struggled. 

The idea of "earning one's keep" has always been a popular one and, once upon a time, this notion extended to the youngest of citizens. 

Between 1870 and 1890, reformers sought to place-out institutionalized dependent children (from county poor farms or orphanages) to farm families. They thought farm life would be healthy for these kids. But the effort was largely detrimental, since a vast number of farmers just wanted free labor -- either in the fields or domestic chores in the home. These kids were often overworked, underfed, and denied the opportunity of schooling.

Called placement homes (later called foster homes), this was a way for the state or county to dispense with the cost of supporting children whose parents were either dead or destitute. Send them to a farm! was the mantra. The idea was to install a work ethic in the children in a place filled with fresh air and honesty. This mindset turned out to be very misguided. Morals and care don't come from rural air, they come from people. And a majority of those who accepted indigent/orphaned kids into their homes did so in order to use them as free laborers. 

An Indiana man wrote about the legendary "Little Orphan Annie" based on a dependent child who lived in his own childhood home during the Civil War: "Little orphan Annie's come to our house to stay. / an' wash the cups and saucers up an' brush the crumbs away. / An' shoo the chickens off the porch an' dust the hearth an' sweep. / An' make the fire an bake the bread an earn her board and keep. The real-life Annie, a girl named Mary Alice, did tasks for the household as would be expected of most placed-out children; she was there to work. Other popular tales of placed-out children happily working on placement farms -- Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farm, and Anne of Green Gables. But the happiness in these stories belie a dark reality. There was no vetting of placement homes, no unannounced checks to ensure a child's safety. It was a system fraught with problems and abuse. 

Reformers did not like kids corralled in group homes or county poor farms. Instead, they sought to place these kids with farm families, hoping that they'd be treated as one of the family. That was not the common situation. Instead, children were taken in during harvest season, used for their labor, then returned to the group home. A 12-yr old girl was brutally raped before escaping. Without required reporting or supervision, children were at risk.

The official practice of mother's aid began in Illinois in 1911, marking a sharp departure from IL's previous reliance on private charities to handle the needs of dependent children. Direct aid was not a magic bullet to stop the need for placement homes, but its use contributed to their decline. Unfortunately, not all counties agreed to fund the program. It was largely viewed as an urban issue, so that widows in rural areas did not receive a pension. This led to their children being put into poor farms or other institutionalized care. 

In 1924, a proposed constitutional amendment banning various forms of industrial child labor drew the ire of farmers and farm bureaus. In the Midwest, two-thirds of kids over age 12 worked in the fields. Ultimately, kids on family farms were excluded from most labor regulations. 

I Who Have Never Known Men, by Jacqueline Harpman

Readers say they love or hate this book. For me, I lean toward the love. This book is a deeply psychological story, and ultimately, it held my attention. 

The apocalyptic book begins with 40 women imprisoned in a cell (the "cage") with male guards who never speak to them, never acknowledge their existence.  39 of the 40 women remember their lives "before." Before the sirens, the violence that tore them from their homes, and the cage in which they now live. Only one was a child when captured, and she's the narrator. Drugs of some sort erased the narrator's memory of her parents and her former life, or she was too young to remember. All she knows are the 39 women, the cage, and the guards. 

There's definitely a Holocaust vibe. Such as with this quote: (the "She" refers to one of the 39 older women) - "She had lived out 25 years of her legitimate destiny, and then crazy events took place and she entered a world of absurdity, surrounded by strange women who were as confused as she was." 

The narrator is always called "the child" by the other women because they never knew her name, and they never bestow a new name on her. This sets the narrator - "the child" - farther apart from the 39 than she already is. She's the only one who doesn't remember "before." She doesn't remember music or books or birds or love. She's never known a life where men are builders, fathers, lovers, war mongers. That seems to be the point of this book -- What would a world without men look like? Would war cease to exist?

I think this book asks: If you're stripped of everything, are you still human? For example, the women must use a toilet in the middle of the cage, which strips them of their dignity. They're not allowed to touch each other - ever. There are no books. Their days and nights are artificial -- the cage is dimmed (not darkened) at odd intervals. The "nights" come at random, as though their body clocks are trying to be scrambled; their circadian rhythms erased.

Some context about the author is interesting. Harpman was born in Belgium; her family fled when the Nazis invaded. Post-WW2, her family returns to Belgium; later, she becomes a psychoanalyst. This book certainly feels like the work of a psychoanalyst.

+++++Spoilers ahead+++++

+++++Spoilers ahead ++++

After the 40 women escape, due to a sudden and unknown circumstance, they find a foreign land outdoors. It's desolate and alien. They don't think they're on Earth. They set about exploring. It's a ton of work to exist. Then this quote grabbed me: "I think they were wondering why they were wearing themselves out trying to survive from day to day in this alien land where only the grave awaited them." -- This quote struck me because this is the view of a depressed person; someone who cannot see the meaning of their existence. I mean, isn't this the point of life? To find meaning in the day to day? Life surely isn't easy or fair, and sometimes it downright rips your heart out...and yet, we must continue to find meaning in our existence. Otherwise, we wither, we cease. 

This quote seems to apply to the entire book, both the cage scenario as well as the "above-ground" situation: "It is impossible to predict what might happen in a world where you don't know the rules."  -- This quote begs the question, If you are stripped of all you know, stripped of the very culture that makes you who you are, stripped of expectations and all the rules you thought applied to your life, what then? 

Miss Peregrine's Home for Peculiar Children, by Ransom Riggs

Ransom Riggs is an excellent writer. Such that I was surprised to find this book classified as YA. But hey, I read & loved the Harry Potter series (in my 40s at the time). 

This science fiction book includes bits of history. Specifically, WW2 and the Holocaust. Not much; just enough to set a context of humankind's ability to be soullessly cruel in order to advance an agenda of power.

We meet Jakob, the narrator, whose Grandpa Portman tells tales of having grown up with kids who could levitate, one invisible, one who can lift tons-heavy boulders, etc.  When small, Jakob believes the stories, but comes to believe these are tall tales. Then, something happens and Jakob's grandpa gives him a cryptic message: "Find the bird. In the loop. On the other side of the old man's grave. September third, 1940." -- In that cryptic message lies the jist of this entire book. 

Riggs uses black & white photos to illustrate various characters and storylines, which adds to the enjoyment of this book. A tip for anyone reading the audiobook: Secure a copy of the hardcover from the library to view the pix!  Riggs tells us that the photos are vintage, found by various people who dug thru pix piles at flea markets and antique stores -- only a few with modifications, he says.  V.e.r.y  I.n.t.e.r.e.s.t.ing! 

This book has a ton of action in the last half. So much that I kept wondering how things would be wrapped up. Well, they weren't. Instead, it's the kind of ending where you must fill in the gaps. I haven't decided whether I'll read the whole series (6 books). For me, I'm okay with filling in the blanks.  

My favorite quote: "I used to dream about escaping my ordinary life, but my life was never ordinary. I had simply failed to notice how extraordinary it was."

This book is 348 pages, with about 30 of those pages containing photos. And full pages devoted to starting the next chapters (11 chapters = 11 mostly blank pages with just "Chapter Two, Three, etc"). Thus, the length, for me, is just right. I'm extraordinarily tired of books with needless filler -- so common these days due to publishers wanting books with higher word count in order to garner a higher price point. Published in 2011, just before Amazon perverted the book world (underselling publishers & allowing Just Q. Anyone to publish goobledegook) -- I recommend this book for sci-fi aficionados -- perhaps especially Potter fans. 

Riggs's series consists of 6 books about Miss Peregrine and the Peculiars: (1) this one. (2) Hollow City. (3) Library of Souls. (4) A Map of Days. (5) The Conference of the Birds. (6) The Desolations of Devil's Acre.