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The Disappearance of Gertrude Tompkins

10/3/2017

Courtesy WASP Archives, Texas Women's University Library.

Author Jim Ure was writing a novel when a true story side-tracked him, the story of a woman's disappearance that has remained unsolved for more than seventy years.

His new book, Seized by the Sun tells how Gertrude Tompkins (left), a shy, awkward girl who stuttered, growing up to be one of only a handful of U.S. women test pilots during WWII.

Her job was to take new or repaired planes to the sky and put them through tight turns, stalls, dives and spins making sure they were safe.

Below: P-51 Mustang fighters. Gertrude was one of only 126 WASP pilots good enough to fly these fighter planes. Her first flight in a powerful P-51 cured the debilitating stutter that had plagued her since childhood.

It was later in the war, on a routine flight, that Gertrude disappeared while ferrying a factory-new plane a short distance between two airfields in California

Author James Ure is on the blog today, telling us how he got hooked on the story.

Author Jim Ure

In the summer of the 2000 I was doing some research for an idea I had about a novel. My writing success had come in non-fiction, but the illusive novel still beckoned.

In this fictional piece I imagined a character who learned his mother had been a woman pilot in World War II and her crashed plane and her remains had just been discovered in a melting glacier in Montana.

I put a note on what I was doing on a Women’s Air Force Pilot user group on Yahoo. The result was unexpected.

I was contacted by the grand niece of Gertrude “Tommy” Tompkins. Laura Whittall-Scherfee, who lives near Sacramento, told me that of the 38 women killed in the WASP during World War II, her grand aunt was the only one still missing.

She was called, “The Other Amelia,” and a sort of cult had grown among the searchers who continue to look for her to this day. Laura and her husband Ken offered me access to the family records. Would I be interested?

Would I ever!

I’d always had a fascination for World War II aviation, and this was an enticement I couldn’t refuse.

It took seventeen years of interviews, combing military files and reading private correspondence to finally give Tommy the fully-dimensional place in aviation history she deserved.

I was lucky to have conversations with a number of WASPs early in my research. Today only about 85 WASPs of the 1,175 who were in service during the war are still alive.

Tommy took off from Mines Air Field (now LAX) on October 26, 1944, and was expected to stay at the Army Air Force Base in Palm Springs that evening.

She was never seen again. Aircraft historian Pat Macha has conducted numerous searches over the years and no trace has ever turned up.

Below: A group of WASPs pray for luck before climbing into a BT-13 unpredictable and sometimes dangerous training plane. Avenger Field, Sweetwater, Texas, circa 1943.

Courtesy WASP Archives, Texas Women's University Library.

The conclusion I have come to after all this time is that she probably crashed into Santa Monica Bay immediately after take-off.

The results of searches of the bay and of the mountains and deserts on her presumed flight path are documented in Seized by the Sun. It’s a mystery yet to be solved, and there are men and women still searching for Tommy.

Thank you, Jim!

Learn more about Jim and his books at www.jimurebooks.com.

Above, WASPs with PT-19, the first plane usually flown in primary training. Women on far left in dark glasses is Gertrude “Tommy” Tompkins, according to Texas Women’s University Libraries WASP Archives.

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One Tough Nurse From the Outback

9/11/2017

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This week, welcome Author Susan Latta with the story of one trailblazing nurse featured in her new book Bold Women of Medicine: 21 Stories of Astounding Discoveries, Daring Surgeries, and Healing Breakthroughs.

Nurse Elizabeth Kenny, circa 1915, courtesy Wikipedia commons

Thank you, Susan!

No one knows whether Elizabeth Kenny had any formal medical training or learned on-the-job, but that didn’t stop her.

She had a red cape and nurse’s jumper made and traveled through Australia’s wild bush land to serve anyone who needed help.

Born in Australia in 1880, at a time when girls were not to be brassy, stubborn, or opinionated. Elizabeth had no intention of following those rules.

I first heard about Elizabeth Kenny when my father had a stroke and was transferred to the Elizabeth Kenny Institute in Minneapolis for recovery. Prior to that, I knew of her in name only.

Author Susan Latta

I remember standing in a long line in the school gym waiting to receive my vaccination in the early 1960s, and had no idea how many people suffered after being stricken by polio.

Decades earlier Elizabeth Kenny had become famous for her treatment for polio, a dreadful virus that caused paralysis and death.

Below: Elisabeth Kenny demonstrating polio treatment to doctors and nurses at the Elizabeth Kenny Institute in Minneapolis, Minnesota, 1943. Library of Congress photo

Elizabeth didn’t know it at the time but discovered her polio treatment one day in 1911.

A frantic farmer called for help for his two-year-old daughter. Amy's arms and
legs were twisted tight with unbearable pain.

Elizabeth Kenny galloped away to send a telegram to her trusted doctor, Aeneas McDonnell. When he replied that it was polio, he said there was nothing to be done, and to do “the best with symptoms presenting themselves.”

"I knew the relaxing power of heat," Elizabeth said. "I filled a frying pan with salt, placed it over the fire, then poured it into a bag and applied it to the leg that was giving the most pain. After an anxious wait, I saw no relief followed the application. I then prepared a linseed meal poultice, but the weight of this seemed only to increase the pain.

"At last I tore a blanket made from soft Australian wool into suitable strips and wrung them out in boiling water. These I wrapped gently about the poor tortured muscles. The whimpering of the child ceased almost immediately, and after a few more applications her eyes closed slowly and she fell asleep.”

Amy recovered. But men in the medical field refused to accept Elizabeth's methods.

In 1914, Elizabeth Kenny traveled to England to serve in WWI. The Australian Army Nursing Service gave her the title of “sister,” which had nothing to do with religion, instead meaning “senior nurse.” She became known as Sister Kenny.

After the war, she presented her methods to control the muscle spasms and re-educate the paralyzed limbs to packed rooms of medical men in Australia. Over and over they called her a quack nurse from the bush, and finally she had had enough. She sailed to America to prove her treatment.

After being turned away by doctors in New York and Chicago, she landed in Minnesota where a few doctors said her treatment did work.

As word spread she gained nationwide support, even landing on a list of most admired women in America nine years running. The Elizabeth Kenny Institute opened in 1942, and still exists today as Courage Kenny, a facility for stroke and accident victims.

At right: A patient is treated in an Iron Lung circa 1960s. Photo courtesy U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention

Polio was eradicated in America when Albert Sabin’s live polio virus vaccine guaranteed immunity, just a few short years after Sister Kenny died in 1952.

Thank you, Susan! I'm excited to learn about the other ground-breaking medical women featured in your book, Bold Women of Medicine: 21 Stories of Astounding Discoveries, Daring Surgeries, and Healing Breakthroughs.

See more about the book and Author Susan Latta here...

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Nine-Year-Old Goes to Jail for Justice

6/6/2017

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You may remember me writing about Audrey Faye Hendricks several years ago. She was nine-years-old, when arrested and sent to jail during a civil rights march in Birmingham, Alabama, in 1963.

I'm excited to tell you about a new book about Audrey, a picture book for primary grade children about an incredibly brave third grader.

The Youngest Marcher, by Cynthia Levinson tells the story of the Birmingham Children's March through the eyes of one little girl.

Audrey's family was friends with Dr. Martin Luther King, and she was inspired by his talk about justice.

Dr. King considered Birmingham the most violently racist city in the country, and he spoke in churches there urging blacks to march in protest of segregation, even though they'd be arrested.

"Fill the jails!" said Dr. King.

"Fill the jails!"

The plan seemed risky to adults, who feared they'd lose their jobs, be assaulted or possibly killed. Few stepped up.

When Civil Rights Leader Reverend James Bevel, suggested school children should march and go to jail, Audrey was one of the first to volunteer.

Some four-thousand young people marched, and kept marching until Birmingham's jails were filled to capacity. Audrey spent seven days in custody, the youngest known child arrested.

Above) Police arrest unidentified child protesters, Birmingham, A.L., 1963. Courtesy Alabama Public Radio. apr.org/post/unity-award-remembering-1963

The Children's March was powerful, helping gain momentum for civil rights across America. Two and a half months later, Birmingham rescinded its segregation laws, and a year later Congress passed the Civil Rights Act of 1964.

Cynthia Levinson's earlier book We've Got a Job: The 1963 Birmingham Children's March tells Audrey's story in more detail, as well as the stories of three other young marchers.

In my 2014 post, here's what Cynthia had to say about the courage of those young civil rights activists:

When I tell school children today about the brave youngsters in Birmingham, they want to know if I would march, too. Would I sing and pray? Would I face dogs, hoses, and jail? The reason that I know, unfortunately, that I would not is that I did not.

In May 1963, I was an eighteen-year-old high school senior in Columbus, Ohio. In fairness, not a single white person joined the black children during their protests in Birmingham so it’s not completely surprising that I didn’t fly down there. (Some white clergymen and the folk singer Joan Baez did, however.
Nevertheless, to the extent that I paid attention to the news, I was bewildered by what was happening down there. Worse, I hardly paid attention at all. In fact, although I knew about the dogs and the hoses, I didn’t know that it was children who took responsibility for desegregating their city until decades later. Furthermore, although later I did participate in a few protests about political issues I cared about, I chose tame ones where no one was going to get hurt.

Because we know how events in the past have turned out, history in hindsight looks inevitable. Young people today could believe that the children of Birmingham weren’t in any real danger. Beforehand, however, Dr. King was so worried that someone might get hurt or killed that he opposed their actions. Sharing my own embarrassing past with them, I think, makes the threats more real. These were truly dangerous times.

Courage, I hope they learn, does not entail ignoring the dangers but, rather, paying attention to them—and then making a decision about whether or not to proceed. Courage, I’ve learned, is not casual. Courage requires a cause. And, courage draws strength from cooperation.

Thank you, Cynthia! So well said. Learn more about Cynthia and her books here...

I also want you to meet the very talented illustrator of The Youngest Marcher, Vanessa
Brantley Newton. (at left)

She says "The beauty of the book is that little children will walk away with- 'I can do something, no matter how small I am, there is something I can do.' That's empowering."

Vanessa demonstrates how she illustrated the book in a live video interview here.... It's amazing to watch her draw! She's fun to listen to, too.

Vanessa is a prolific illustrator. Check out more of her work here...

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Unbroken: The Women's Story

5/2/2017

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Author Kathryn Atwood

I am traveling this week, so I've invited Author Kathryn Atwood to tell you about her book Women Heroes of World War II: The Pacific Theater.

She shares the heartbreaking story of three women who, like Louis Zamperini, whose story is told in Unbroken, endured through hardship and torture to survive WWII. Thank you, Kathryn.

My personal images and interest in WWII—as well as a previous book I'd written--all focused on the European conflict. My Army Air Corps dad and his three brothers had all flown in the European Theater and while I was in high school The Hiding Place [the story of Corrie ten Boom] had come to theaters.

So the two basic images implanted in my mind regarding WWII—tall, dashing, Dutch-American flyboys and a middle-aged Dutch woman who defied the Nazis by hiding Jews—had, apart from Pearl Harbor, made me consider WWII as a primarily European conflict and had compartmentalized the war in my brain under the category of courage, not necessarily endurance.

Reading the memoirs and biographies of the women featured in what would become Women Heroes of World War II: The Pacific Theater, I came to understand that endurance was precisely what the Pacific War had been for millions of people; not only for American troops fighting an enemy who refused to surrender, but for the civilians unfortunate enough to find themselves in Japanese-controlled territory.

Three women featured in my book perhaps fit more precisely into the Unbroken category because they, like Louis Zamperini, endured intentional physical torture.

Elizabeth Choy, Sybil Kathigasu, and Claire Phillips all suffered at the hands of the Kempetai, the Japanese military police, who, like the German Gestapo, were tasked with weeding out resistance activities.

Elizabeth Choy

Elizabeth Choy found herself in their hands inadvertently after she had unknowingly passed radio parts to Allied prisoners in Singapore.

The Japanese were convinced she was part of a larger plot so to obtain the desired confession, they tortured her nearly to death. Deeply religious, she refused to lie, even to save her life.

Sybil Kathigasu, on the other hand, was an active member of the Malayan resistance: she provided medical care to local guerilla fighters.

She was caught and taken into Kempeitai custody where one officer named Eko Yoshimura took a special interest in breaking her. He nearly destroyed Kathigasu's body but her will remained intact and she never divulged the information Yoshimura sought.

Claire Phillips, an American member of the Manila resistance, charmed and chatted up Japanese officers in her nightclub, gleaning precious tidbits of intel, then used her earnings to sneak food to starving American POWs.

Claire Phillips

Claire was caught, interrogated, tortured, and starved by the Kempeitai for nearly nine months without betraying anyone.

Conversion to Christianity saved Zamperini from his dark, downward spiral but not all American Pacific War POWs fared as well: they suffered far more PTS, alcoholism, premature death, suicide, and divorce in comparison with their counterparts released from German POW camps.

I found a similar trend among the women whose stories I encountered while writing my book. Sybil Kathigasu died three years after the war from complications arising from her beatings. Claire Phillips died in 1960 from alcoholism-related meningitis.

All war creates suffering in the moment and in the aftermath. The Pacific War seemed to be a conflict in which this was intensely true for reasons I’m still sorting out. But whatever the reason, the people who stood up to Japanese fascism deserve respect and remembrance just as much as those who defied the Nazis.

Louie Zamperini once dismissed his war hero status, claiming that mere survival does not make one a hero. Millions of his fans--myself included--profoundly disagree. Surviving the Pacific War was more than enough to earn the designation.

Thanks you, Kathryn.
Learn more about Author Kathryn Atwood and her books here...

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Unfinished Business!

4/17/2017

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Imagine devoting your entire adult life to a cause, living more than 90-years, and dying with unfinished business.

Alice Paul believed that men and women should be equal partners in society, and she was behind most 20th Century efforts for women's rights in the United States, including women's right to vote.

Now, close to 100 years after Alice Paul started the fight for an Equal Rights Amendment, women in the U.S. are still second class citizens under the law. (See video below)

In October 1917, Alice Paul and three other suffragists were arrested for protesting at the west gate of the White House. She did not go quietly, believing that equal rights for women would not be gained without extreme measures.

Confined behind bars, her only power was refusing to eat. She had resorted to hunger strikes before when arrested in England.

When the forcible feeding was ordered I was taken from my bed, carried to another room and forced into a chair, bound with sheets and sat upon bodily by a fat murderer, whose duty it was to keep me still. Then the prison doctor, assisted by two woman attendants, placed a rubber tube up my nostrils and pumped liquid food through it into the stomach. Twice a day for a month, from November 1 to December 1, this was done. ~Alice Paul Talks, Philadelphia Tribune, January 1910.

A new biography of Alice Paul brings the story of this less-well-known suffragist to teenagers in ALICE PAUL AND THE FIGHT FOR WOMEN'S RIGHTS.

Author Deborah Kops agreed to talk with me about Alice's passion and determination.

Deborah Kops: I am awed by Paul’s courage and her willingness to risk her life to help women win the vote. Her health was fragile, and she jeopardized it on a regular basis when she was young.

Paul went on her longest hunger strike, which lasted three weeks, in 1917, when she was in jail in Washington, D.C. (she went on three hunger strikes years before in the UK).

For most of that time, she was force fed, which is very painful. A hunger strike was her only means of fighting her imprisonment and reminding the public that women wanted the ballot.

She and the other Woman’s Party members who went without food (more than twenty) got plenty of coverage in newspapers around the country, which embarrassed Woodrow Wilson. Less than two months after Paul’s release, Wilson finally announced his support for the woman suffrage amendment.

The amendment was ratified August 18, 1920.

Above: Fellow Suffragists protesting Alice Paul's arrest and incarceration for picketing the White House. Photo courtesy of the Historic National Women's Party, Sewell-Belmont House and Museum, Washington D.C.

Deborah, this book seems personal to you. (Author pictured below)

I became a feminist during the women’s movement of the late sixties and early seventies, which historians call the second wave. And I assumed that the Equal Rights Amendment, which we were fighting for, was written in the sixties. I learned that the amendment was Alice Paul’s idea and that she wrote it in 1923!

A century later, when Hillary Clinton made her acceptance speech as the first woman nominated by a major political party for the presidency, I was very touched to see her wearing white, the color that suffragists often wore beneath their sashes.

When I joined the Women’s March in Boston in January, I was very proud to wear a sash with the National Woman’s Party colors—purple, white, and gold—over my jacket.

Thank you for taking time for this interview, Deborah, and for writing about this courageous woman!

You can see all of Deborah Kops books at her website here, including The Great Molasses Flood: Boston, 1919 which Kirkus Reviews calls A fascinating account of a truly bizarre disaster.

Back to the Equal Rights Amendment. If you know anyone living in the states colored yellow below...ask them if they know their state has not ratified the ERA.
Then check out the video below (it's less than two minutes long). Feel free to forward this newsletter. Thanks www.equalrightsamendment.org for the map.

Just three weeks ago Nevada became the 36th state to ratify the ERA (45 years to the day after Congress passed it). This year ERA bills have been introduced in the legislatures of Arizona, Florida, Illinois, North Carolina, Utah, and Virginia.

Thanks www.equalrightsamendment.org for the map.

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The Dark Story of America's Shining Women

3/26/2017

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So excited today to interview Author Kate Moore talking about courage, and her soon-to-be-released-in-the-US book THE RADIUM GIRLS: THE DARK STORY OF AMERICA'S SHINING WOMEN. (Audio Book cover below)

Young women hired to paint glow-in-the-dark numbers on wrist watches in the 1910-20s were (in)dispensable to United States Radium, a manufacturer of one of the hottest new products of the era.

'The first thing we asked was, “Does this stuff hurt you?” And they said, “No.” The company said that it wasn’t dangerous, that we didn’t need to be afraid.’

Catherine Donohue and co-workers died of that "stuff." Their courage established a precedent that led to workers' rights to hold their employers accountable when their job makes them sick.

I asked Kate Moore, what was it like to uncover the details of these women's fight for acknowledgement of their suffering?

Kate Moore: "Well, it was extraordinary. And a real privilege – to feel like I was learning what they’d been through. It was particularly striking because for nearly a century no one had listened to their voices and words that were there in the archives all along. It was shocking to realize how cruelly they had been treated. It was sobering to uncover what they’d suffered physically. And it was inspiring to learn that despite all this they never gave up fighting and were always there for each other."

During WWI, U.S. Radium produced a high-tech paint containing radium called
Undark which allowed U.S. soldiers to read their wristwatches and instrument panels at night.

After the war the company used Undark to manufacture a variety of products from buckles on bedroom slippers to gasoline gauges.

While scientists began to learn more about the dangers of radium, the corporation continued to tell the public it was safe in small quantities.

But the factory women were exposed to much higher levels. Their clothing often glowed when they arrived home from work, and some women painted their fingernails with the fizzy, shining paint. When they began to sicken and die, nobody believed them when they said Undark was killing them.

New hires at U.S. Radium, many of them teenagers, were trained to suck the tip of their paintbrush to achieve a fine point in order to coat radium on the tiny numbers of wrist watches.

Like clockwork, they painted hands and digits on some 200 watch faces a day at five cents a piece, a good income at the time.

The tiny amounts of radium they swallowed before painting each numeral acted like calcium stored away in their bones, except it didn't strengthen their bones, it diseased them, bombarding radiation throughout their bodies.

Kate (right) learned in her research that male lab technicians working in the very same company must have known something the women didn't. Company chemists used lead screens, masks, and tongs when working with the paint.

Five women won their lawsuit against the company in the 1930s, but they were shunned by neighbors, and forty years later men at the company still believed the women had been lying.

Associate Press photo of Catherine, Tom Donohue and their children.

Kate Moore: I tried to empathise with the women as deeply as I could. Their letters and interviews obviously give an incredible insight into them. So I did feel, as best I could, that I knew Catherine. I had to, in order to write her story.

There were two things that struck me. The first was how ordinary she was, in a way: a mother, a wife, a friend. A woman who got lonely when no one could visit her in a distant hospital. A woman who got worried when her husband couldn’t find work.

The second, of course, was how extraordinary she was: the way she kept fighting for her children, her husband, her friends.

Catherine Donohue fainted during a court hearing when a doctor described how she had no hope of recovering from radium poisoning.

Later lawyers visited her at home, as she testified from her deathbed.

Courtesy Chicago Daily Times.

www.amazon.com/Fannie-Never-Flinched-Struggle-American/dp/1419718843Kate Moore:The photographs of her from June 1938, shortly before her death, show how emaciated she was, yet her spirit burned so strongly inside her, despite the weakening of her body.

She was determined never to give up. Journalists talked of their surprise at the passion in her voice because of the frailty of her body. She fought to the death for this cause.

Catherine said her faith sustained her. I think a lot of it was also to do with friendship. She had seen friends die from the same cause that had made her sicken and I think she was determined to hold the company to account.

What these women went through physically was horrific: losing their teeth and jawbones, constantly pus-seeping mouths, broken limbs and backs, huge tumors. They were crippled and killed. And they knew the company was to blame. So I think the sheer injustice of it also fired their courage.

Thank you, Kate! I appreciate you taking the time for an interview.

Five dial painters sued the Orange, New Jersey defense contractor for $250,000 each, but couldn't wait for trial delays and roadblocks engineered by the company. They were dying.

After initial hearings in 1927, the women
accepted a mediated settlement, $10,000 per woman, plus legal and medical expenses, and a $600 per year annuity for as long as they lived. U.S. Radium ended up paying few annuities.

You can pre-order the book here...

Reminder: In celebration of Women's
History Month, I'm giving away a copy of Fannie Never Flinched, a CD of Labor Singer Anne Feeney and a free Skype Author visit to your book group, union meeting, library or school. Enter here...

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Free Book Giveaway to Celebrate Women's History Month

3/10/2017

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What would you do for your principles?

Fannie Sellins went hungry and cold and she went to jail. She challenged powerful men and mighty corporations with nothing but her voice, and her ability to bring people together and inspire hope.

When gunmen threatened to kill her, she stood on the picket line strong as steel. For her principles, Fannie died with a bullet to the back.

This astounding story has gone untold for generations. Enter now to win a free copy of Fannie Never Flinched: One Woman's Courage in the Struggle for American Labor Union Rights.

a Rafflecopter giveaway

It brings me to tears every time I hear it. I am not kidding! Listen below. Utah Phillips called Anne, "The best labor singer in North America."

The Grand Prize includes the book, the CD, and then there's more!

If you're the grand prize winner, I'll visit your union meeting, book group, library, or classroom via Skype. I'll talk about my ten year research and obsession with Fannie Sellins, how I kept faith in my vision and how FANNIE NEVER FLINCHED came to be the beautiful book that it is! Or, you pick a topic and we'll visit via Skype at a mutually agreeable time.

Enter as many times as you want and tell your friends! All prize drawing will occur on or before April 1, 2017.

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Imagine the Day of Atonement Under Nazi Rule

10/11/2016

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The Nazis purposefully chose Jewish holy days for effect when introducing anti-Semitic policies in occupied-Poland. They toyed with people before moving on to genocide.

When the Nazi's attacked Warsaw September, 1939, it didn't matter if you were Jewish or Catholic or atheist, everyone worked together for weeks, hoping to hold the city against the Germans.

Photo courtesy Polish National Digital Archive https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=4139293

The Polish Army understood that Yom Kippur was the most holy day of the year for Jews and excused them that day from the crucial work of digging defensive trenches.

But German bombs had destroyed many synagogues and homes in Jewish neighborhoods so all able males, including children and old men rallied at the city’s barricades, praying the prayers for the Day of Atonement while they worked to protect their city, even as air attacks continued.

From Irena's Children, Young Readers Edition, a year later, Oct. 12, 1940

"Already there was tension. The Germans had forbidden all public worship and a number of Jews had decided they would defy the order. As many were rising from sleep, loudspeakers squawked outside their windows. Jewish leaders, the Judenräte, heard the news from city officials, but ordinary people, Irena’s friends, heard it blaring in the street. It was the most sweeping edict yet. Every Jew in Warsaw must move into one small section of the city. They had two weeks. There would be no exceptions."

A long blast of the shofar marked nightfall and the close of Yom Kippur in Warsaw’s Jewish neighborhood. Panic gripped the Jewish community at news of the Nazi’s latest command. The Germans wasted none of their orderly methods on a system to help the nearly one in four Warsaw families ordered to pick up household and move.

Photo below courtesy Library of Congress, European Jew blows Sabbath shofar, circa 1935

Before the Nazis invaded Poland, 375,000 Jews lived in the capital city, about 30% of Warsaw's total population. As German bombs fell and the Polish Army retreated, refugees flooded to Warsaw pushing the number of Jewish people eventually imprisoned in the ghetto to 450,000.

At the end of the war, only 11,500 Jews had survived. Twenty-five hundred of those were children rescued by Irena Sendler and her underground network. Read that story in Irena's Children.

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IRENA'S CHILDREN Debuts Next Week! Here's What You Won't See in the Book

9/23/2016

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Irena’s Children, Young Readers Edition [Simon & Schuster] has historical photographs throughout, but many did not make the cut.

Here's one showing three of the children who's lives Irena saved, Michal Glowinski, Piotrus Zysman, and Elzbieta Koppel.

I don't know when or where the photo was taken. Piotr, in the middle, was four years old when he was sneaked out of the Warsaw Ghetto. I first told Elzbieta's story here. At that time I didn't know I'd later be invited to work on a book about Irena.

The photo below of Irena and an unidentified child is courtesy of the Museum of Polish Jews.

Courage was rooted deep in Irena's family. During the January Uprising in 1863, which started as a protest by young Poles against conscription into the Imperial Russian Army, Irena's great grandfather's small estate was headquarters for the insurgents near Kalisz in central Poland.

The Russians put down the Polish-Lithuanian rebels, executed many and deported others to Siberia, including Irena's maternal great grandfather Karol Grzybowski. He died after a year of hard labor manacled to a wheeled cart.

Irena was greatly influenced by her father, Stanislaw Krzyzanowski's political activities and compassion for the poor, which is detailed in the book. During a typhoid epidemic in their local area, Irena's father was the only doctor who would treat those suffering the illness. He ended up catching the disease himself and dying when Irena was a young child.

Little wonder, Irena would later risk her life posing as a nurse to enter the Jewish Ghetto carrying medicine and food for the sick and starving. (Photograph courtesy of www.chabad.org & The Jewish Women.org)

Above, Irena Sendler rides in a parade in Warsaw in 1948. (Courtesy Of The Irena Sendler Project) You might think that she would remain a celebrity for her humanitarian deeds, but after World War II when Poland fell to the Communists, Irena was persona non grata like others who had supported or fought for Polish Independence.

Irena's Children hits bookstore shelves September 27. Pre-order now to have your book that day!

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Imagine: A Teenage Girl goes to War to Impress Her Mom...and that's just the beginning

3/25/2016

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Two Women Revolutionized Science and Changed the World.
Irene Curie--not Marie Curie, the Nobel-Prize-winning scientist you've heard about, but her teenage daughter. The story takes one twist after another, and here to tell it is Winifred Conklin author of the new book Radioactive!

Seventeen-year-old Irene Curie volunteered to serve in World War I as an x-ray technician. She used portable x-rays to help surgeons identify shrapnel and perform operations near the battlefield.

Below Irene Curie on a mobile x-ray unit in 1916.

Her mother had developed the military x-ray program. Marie wanted to win her mother’s respect, and, frankly, she wanted to spend some time with her mom. This combination of brilliant scientist and vulnerable teen made her an irresistible subject to me.

Lise Meitner in the laboratory (1913).

The Germans were using x-ray technology, too. Lise Meitner, an Austrian who had been working in Berlin when the war began, performed the same work as Irene. She was an x-ray technician on the German side of WWI.

Both Curie and Meitner would prove to be among the most accomplished female scientists of the 20th century. These women were among a handful of physicists worldwide who were working on better understanding atomic structure.

Curie had been born into the “First Family of Science” (both of her parents had won Nobel Prizes), But Meitner had been turned away from higher education programs because she was a woman.

She finally had a chance to study physics at the University of Vienna in 1901, but she repeatedly came up against obstacles.

She was not paid in the early years of her research program, and she had to set up her own laboratory in the basement of the science building because she was not allowed to work in the main lab with the men.

The chief scientist claimed he was afraid her hair would catch fire, even though she wore her hair in a tight bun and the men in the lab almost universally wore elaborate facial hair.

Otto Stern and Lise Meitner, possibly 1937 colloquy with Nobel Price winners

During their careers, both Irene and Lise made important discoveries in the understanding of physics. Curie and her husband, Frederic Joliot, discovered artificial radiation. They won a Nobel Prize in 1934 for their work.

Lise had to flee Nazi Germany in 1938, leaving her laboratory and research behind. She continued to consult with her former lab partner, Otto Hahn, and she made the breakthrough in understanding of nuclear fission.

Ultimately, Hahn took credit for her discovery and claimed the Nobel Prize for the work they did together. Lise Meitner and Otto Hahn in West Germany in 1962.

Bombing of Nagasaki, Japan

The women had seen such horrors on the battlefields during World War I that they had become pacifists; both were horrified that the work they did in the name of science had been used for the creation of the most destructive weapon in the history.

“It is an unfortunate accident that this discovery (of fission) came about in a time of war,” Meitner said.

I find these women inspiring not only because of their accomplishments, but also because of their humanity.

They were undeniably gifted scientists, but they also held fast to their love of peace. Curie dedicated her later years to working for nuclear disarmament; Meitner worked on the development of nuclear energy.

Throughout their lives, they both envisioned a world where scientists could master the art of using the power of the atom not for a weapon but for the benefit of humankind.

Winifred, thrilled to have you on the blog today, and to highlight your wonderful book. Thank you!

Winifred Conkling is an award-winning author of fiction and nonfiction for young readers whose works include Passenger on the Pearl: The True Story of Emily Edmonson’s Flight from Slavery (Algonquin, 2015) and the middle-grade novel Sylvia and Aki, winner of the Jane Addams Children’s Literature Award and the Tomás Rivera Award. See more about Winifred's books here.

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Announcing My New Book!

3/11/2016

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Coming in September!

Irena's Children
Young Readers Edition

The "Female Oskar Schindler"

From the publisher...
At long last, the extraordinary and long forgotten story of Irena Sendler—who took staggering risks to save 2,500 children from death and deportation in Nazi-occupied Poland during World War II—now adapted for a younger audience.

Irena Sendler was a young Polish woman living in Warsaw during World War II. With guts of steel, Irena crossed the walled Jewish ghetto with babies in toolboxes and coffins, snuck them under overcoats at checkpoints, and slipped them through the dank sewers. Then she convinced her friends and underground resistance network to hide them.

In this heroic tale of survival and selflessness, Tilar Mazzeo and adapter Mary Cronk Farrell share the true story of this bold and brave woman, who risked her life to save innocent children from the horrors of the Holocaust.

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You Won't Want to Miss this Vivid, Inspiring Native American Story

2/17/2016

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Once in a while you find a book that you want to buy for everyone you know.

Hiawatha and the Peacemaker strikes me that way.

I thought it ironic that I stumbled upon this book in the middle of great debate about immigration in America, about how best to confront terrorism and about how to be most true to our democratic ideals.

Hiawatha lived in a time of war, when violence could strike without warning and without mercy. His people, the Iroquois ranged across what is now New York State, Ontario and Quebec long before European immigrants arrived.

The story opens with Hiawatha mourning his wife and three daughters. They'd been killed in an attack on his village and everything he cared about had been burned to the ground. Vivid illustrations by David Shannon evoke emotion throughout the story.

Hiawatha could think of nothing but revenge, until a stranger showed up and told him of the Great Law of Peace. “Fighting among our people must stop. We must come together as one body, one mind, and one heart.”

Hiawatha was skeptical, but agreed to go to his people, the Mohawk, and help the Peacemaker present the Great Law. The Clan Mothers nodded at this idea of becoming one family, but the War Chief argued that the Onondaga chief was too strong, too violent and the Mohawk must remain ready to fight.

Hiawatha and the Peacemaker left the Mohawk, traveling to carry the message to the Cayuga, the Oneida, the Seneca and the Onondaga. He faced down hostile warriors, suspicion, and his own hatred, anger and pain.

With the help of the Peacemaker Hiawatha was healed of his desire for revenge and learned forgiveness.

Eventually, they succeeded in bringing the five nations together to lay down their weapons and trust peace.

The Five Nations of the Iroquois formed a confederacy on the Great Law of Peace, thought to be the oldest participatory democracy on earth. Benjamin Franklin, John Hancock and Thomas Jefferson were influenced by this peaceful union's self-government.

The author of the book, Robbie Robertson wrote the story from his memory of hearing it as a child from an Elder wisdom-keeper on the reservation. Robertson is of Mohawk and Cayuga heritage.

According to Robertson, Henry Wadsworth Longfellow mixed up another man with the real Hiawatha in his poem, so don't look for Gutche Gumee in this book.

This book is not his first foray into the arts. Robinson has a long and distinguished career in music for which he's been inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame, given a Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award, landed on Rolling Stone magazine’s lists of greatest artists and greatest guitar players of all time, as well as collaborated with filmmaker Martin Scorsese, and produced albums by artists like Van Morrison and Neil Diamond.

I can't leave this story without mentioning that in the Iroquois Federation men and women shared power. A Clan Mother Jikonhsaseh was
instrumental in forming the democracy.

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Completely helpless at the whim of people who want to kill you...

2/6/2016

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Thanks to Author Brandon Marie Miller for guest posting here this week, filling in while I recover from my six-day research trip to Washington D.C.

Brandon is an award-winning author of nine titles on U.S. history topics. Her story about a woman accused of witchcraft and hanged, touches on an experience I've been thinking a lot about lately.

Being completely helpless at the whim of people who want to kill you.

My research turned up a letter to President Roosevelt from a woman whose son is set to be hanged by the U.S. Army. Just thinking of this kind of helplessness makes me short of breath.

You've probably heard the name of Eddie Slovak, the white soldier executed for deserting in WWII. They even made a movie about him. Seen any movies about a black soldier executed?

Out of 70 soldiers court-martialed and executed in Europe during the war years, 55 of the men were black. Blacks made of 10 percent of the army.

A number of these men were hanged on extremely flimsy testamony. There's some evidence black soldiers were scapegoated for the crime of rape to save the reputation of the US Army during WWII.

In her new book, Women of Colonial America, Brandon Marie Miller writes about a woman facing similar circumstances.

The Courage of Martha Corey

Martha Corey on trial

She says, "to be accused of a crime-- with your life hanging in the balance-- and have no way to defend yourself, is terrifying. "

Brandon knew the ending to Martha Corey's story before she started her research. Martha's name appears on the list of those executed for practicing witchcraft in Salem Village in 1692.

Brandon's challenge was to make Martha more than just a name and get readers to care about her. So, how'd you answer that challenge, Brandon?

The answer lay in the 300-year-old record of Martha's examination and court depositions.

She at first briskly denied the accusations. But as the "afflicted" girls took over the courtroom with their hysterics, I felt her shift to bewilderment, to panic, to despair.

My heart ached for Martha, so alone against so many. I felt anger toward the accusers. Only one of the girls later publicly apologized for her role, saying she'd been deluded by the devil.

Martha remained true to herself through months of imprisonment. She never attempted to save herself by confessing or accusing others. And in the face of mass hysteria, that took real courage.

Three women had already been accused of witchcraft when a constable arrived at the home of Giles and Martha Corey in March 1692. The man carried a warrant for Martha’s arrest, charging she’d “committed sundry acts of Witchcraft.”

Martha's arrest warrent

"...suspicion of having committed sundry acts of witchcraft and thereby done much harm..."

Since January, witch hysteria had swept Salem Village. A handful of preteen girls and teenage servants made the accusations. Normally, society would scarcely notice these girls.

Now, people recorded their every sentence, every move. Older and poorer women proved easy targets. Martha’s arrest shocked people; she was a prosperous farmer’s wife and an elected church member.

Twelve-year-old Ann Putnam had first told her parents that Martha appeared to her and tortured her with pinching “and other ways.” When Martha visited the Putnam house Ann fell into a choking fit, her body twisted in agony.

A servant in the household claimed Martha’s apparition beat her with an iron rod. Other girlish voices chimed in over the next few weeks-- Martha hurt them and consorted with the devil.

Two days after her arrest Martha appeared before Magistrate John Hathorne in Salem’s packed meeting house. Hathorne’s first words accused her: “You are now in the hands of Authority tell me now why you hurt these persons.”

Martha denied she hurt anyone. “I am an innocent person: I never had to do with Witchcraft since I was born,” she answered. “I am a Gospel Woman.”

Hathorne soon lost control of the court when “the afflicted” interrupted the proceedings. Abigail Williams pointed toward Martha—“There is a man whispering in her ear.”

“We must not believe all that these distracted children say,” Martha told Hathorne. “I saw no body.”

Then the accusers fell to the floor, shrieking in pain. Martha must have looked on, helpless and horrified. The judge urged her to confess, adding, “Do you think to find mercy by aggravating your sins?”

Martha simply replied, “But I cannot confess.” Martha continued to proclaim her innocence. “What can I do? Many rise up against me.”

Nineteen people were hanged after being convicted in the Salem Witch Trials.

Thank you, Brandon! I'm looking forward to reading your new book!

When I visited the Salem Witch Trial Museum several years ago, they had a wonderful exhibit showing how the accusations of witchcraft fit into a pattern of scapegoating and violence down through the centuries.

Warsaw Ghetto Deportations - Photo courtesy http://holocaustresearchproject.org

Of course, a prime example is the the Holocaust, which just so happens to be another topic I've been researching lately.

I can't help feeling great gratitude that I get to sleep at night without worrying I'll be targeted by violence. And I can't help thinking about other groups of people here in America and around the world that don't have that luxury.

Read about Martha and 13 more courageous Colonial Women here.
Check out Brandon's website here...

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The Story that Cast a Shadow for Decades

10/2/2015

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I read the The White Rose when I was eleven or twelve years old. Ten days ago, I wouldn’t have been able to tell you the title or name of the protagonist. But then I stumbled upon the story, a story I had not heard in more than 40-years, a story that often came to mind, but blurry in my memory.

I stumbled upon a live wire stretching back to my childhood and the shock and horror of that particular story surged up to the present, as fresh as the day I first felt it.

For many, it's The Diary of Anne Frank that brings Nazi Germany up close and personal for the first time. For me, it was The White Rose and Sophie Scholl. Sophie set the standard for courage, both consciously and unconsciously throughout my life.

read practically a book a day in my pre- and early-teen years, and I liked nothing more than a chilling adventure story that kept me reading well past my bedtime.

The White Rose was such a story, though it was not fiction, as were most books I read. When I reached the last chapter and young Sophie and her brother Hans were executed, I was caught by complete surprise. Nothing in my short life had prepared me for Hitler.

The siblings, 21-yr-old Sophie and 24-year-old Hans printed and distributed literature denouncing Hitler and the Nazi government. The pamphlets called on Germans to "cast off the cloak of indifference" and engage in passive resistance to topple the regime.

Hans and his friends went out at night and painted slogans on buildings at the university they attended: Hitler the Mass Murderer and Freedom!

This photo shows the group at the Munich railway station in 1942, the summer before they were arrested and put to death. Sophie is behind the fence, Hans in the center facing the camera, Christoph Probst to the fore, and Alexander Schmorell and Willi Graf to the right.

Since I rediscovered Sophie's story in the book Women Heroes of World War II, by Kathryn J. Atwood, I've had a sick-to-my-stomach feeling of fear and dread off and on, as well as finding myself close to tears in unguarded moments.

As my childhood experience of this story revisited me, I realized I had often measured myself against Sophie. Holding my whiny self up to her light, I always fell short. Below, Sophie Scholl's mug shots.

Memorial in Munich

When I first came across Fannie Sellins’ story, (which is now my forthcoming book) the title of the article was In the Midst of Terror, She Went Out to Her Work. I pursued details as if they were an antidote to my fatal condition. How had Fannie found the courage to go out on the picket line day after day when violent men had threatened to kill her?

When I discovered the American military nurses that had been captured POW by the Japanese in WWII, (the subject of Pure Grit) I went on a mad search of the internet for details. I ordered every book I could find that had been written about them. How had these women survived starvation, sickness, isolation for three long years in captivity? How had they kept courage when day 930 in prison camp turned into day 931.

As a girl, I could imagine myself bravely printing forbidden pamphlets to protest an unfair government. But I only identified with Sophie to a point. I did not have the courage to risk my life as she did.

Sophie’s conviction never left her. She and Hans were executed three hours after their sentencing for treason. The prison guards reported: “They were led off, the girl first, she went without the flicker of an eyelash. None of us understood how this was possible. The executioner said he had never seen anyone meet his end as she did."

Sophie told her cell mate the day before her death, "It is such a splendid, sunny day, and I have to go. But how many have to die on the battlefield in these days, how many young promising lives... What does my death matter if by our acts thousands of people are warned and alerted."

Today, I am not measuring myself against Sophie's courage. I'm accepting myself for who I am, and I'm freer to see Sophie more clearly, too.

When her story is no longer tinged with my self-judgement, I have greater capacity to be inspired by her integrity, to marvel at her valor, and to believe in our human ability to act with virtue in depraved and brutal circumstances.

Any thoughts? I'd love to hear from you. Leave your comment below.

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Daring Women of the American Revolution

9/12/2015

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I think of myself as a history buff, so I am a bit embarrassed to admit that I never gave much thought to womens' contributions to the American Revolution.
Not until I read the new book Women Heroes of the American Revolution: 20 Stories of Espionage, Sabotage, Defiance, and Rescue.

Rich, poor, beautiful, plain, city women and farm wives, all ages, even teenage girls helped in the cause of liberty.

These women did not hesitate, but acted with bravery and resourcefulness, sharing whatever resources and skills they possessed in the fight for independence, often risking their lives, fortunes and “sacred honor” just as the men did.

Today I've invited Author Susan Casey to tell us about some of those brave women.

Nearly every American knows about Paul Revere and his ride to warn the Continental Army. Why don't we know about 16-year-old Sybil Ludington?

Sybil rode twice as far as Paul Revere, roughly 40 miles to muster the troops of her father's militia, alerting them to join her father to join the other forces fighting against the British during the Battle of Danbury.

Author Susan Casey

As I delved into the lives of the women featured in my book I felt pulled into their stories, into a process of not only gathering facts but also trying to understand who they were and what motivated them.

I wondered about the feelings of Sybil Ludington, as she rode her horse though the dead of night.

What was she thinking about?
Was she scared?

I was frustrated by the lack of information about her and many others but no less curious. I wanted to know more about what prompted Lydia Darragh to walk miles to warn George Washington of an impending attack without telling anyone, including her husband.

Many of their stories were single incidents.
I wondered what the rest of their lives were like.

For example, while I found many books featuring the story of Prudence Wright as leader of the Pitchfork Brigade I was captivated to find that besides being able to organize an ambush she excelled in the art of sand scouring, a way of cleaning and also creating patterns on her wooden floor.

Discovering that fact made her come alive for me and gave me a window into a small aspect of life in another era. Days after shots were fired at Lexington and Concord setting off the American Revolution, Prudence Wright organized the women of her town of Pepperell, Massachusetts to waylay couriers taking plans to the British.

Dressed in their husband's clothing and armed with pitchforks, the women surprised the men. To Prudence's dismay one of the couriers was her own brother.

Betty Zane was only sixteen in 1782 when she fought with only a few dozen other settlers to defend Fort Henry, a frontier village in what is now West Virginia.

The British and their Native American allies would have won the conflict if Betty had not run across the battlefield and retrieved much needed gunpowder from a nearby cabin.

When she ran back across the field arrows and shots flew past her, some ripping through her petticoat. She safely slid through the doors of the fort making possible a win for the Americans in one of the last battles of the American Revolution.

As I researched and wrote about these women, I felt as though I was living with twenty plus roommates.  I was as involved in their lives as in the lives of people I actually know.  In the months since I finished the book I find myself missing the women and searching for ways to visit them again.

Thank you, Susan! I felt much the same way about the WWII Nurses I wrote about in Pure Grit.

I enjoyed reading Susan's book, which you can buy here... Women Heroes of the American Revolution. Find more about Susan Casey here...

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Author Mary Cronk Farrell

The Disappearance of Gertrude Tompkins

One Tough Nurse From the Outback

Nine-Year-Old Goes to Jail for Justice

Unbroken: The Women's Story

Unfinished Business!

The Dark Story of America's Shining Women

Free Book Giveaway to Celebrate Women's History Month

Imagine the Day of Atonement Under Nazi Rule

IRENA'S CHILDREN Debuts Next Week! Here's What You Won't See in the Book

Imagine: A Teenage Girl goes to War to Impress Her Mom...and that's just the beginning

Announcing My New Book!

Coming in September!

Irena's Children
Young Readers Edition

You Won't Want to Miss this Vivid, Inspiring Native American Story

Completely helpless at the whim of people who want to kill you...

The Courage of Martha Corey

The Story that Cast a Shadow for Decades

Daring Women of the American Revolution

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Coming in September!​Irena's ChildrenYoung Readers Edition

The Courage of Martha Corey

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Coming in September!

Irena's Children
Young Readers Edition