James Cooley's mother had 10 children by six different fathers. She knew she could not care for all her sons and daughters, living as they did in the projects of Chattanooga, Tennessee. So she sent James and his older brother to live with their aunt and uncle in the tiny farming town of Graham, Alabama. Through humor, wit and engaging storytelling, James Cooley paints a picture about his arrival in that rural town in the deep South and his immediate realization that his life would never be the same again. In vivid detail, Cooley lays out his struggle to adjust from city life to country life and then back again to city life. Along the way, the lessons he learned molded him into a successful member of his community and a proud servant to his country. Now he shares those hard-earned lessons to educate, encourage and enlighten our next generation of leaders and the heroes who are helping them on their journey.

An "enormously entertaining" portrait of "a Bronx Tom Sawyer" (San Francisco Chronicle), City Boy is a sharp and moving novel of boyhood from Pulitzer Prize winner Herman Wouk. A hilarious and often touching tale of an urban kid's adventures and misadventures on the street, in school, in the countryside, always in pursuit of Lucille, a heartless redhead personifying all the girls who torment and fascinate pubescent lads of eleven.

Traces the fortunes and misfortunes of Herbie Bookbinder, an eleven-year-old who lives in the Bronx.

In 1933 and 1934, Thomas Minehan, a young sociologist at the University of Minnesota, joined the ranks of a roving army of 250,000 boys and girls torn from their homes during the Great Depression. Disguised in old clothes, he hopped freight trains crisscrossing six midwestern states. While undercover, Minehan associated on terms of social equality with several thousand transients, collecting five hundred life histories of the young migrants. The result was a vivid and intimate portrayal of a harrowing existence, one in which young people suffered some of the deadliest blows of the economic disaster. Boy and Girl Tramps of America reveals the poignant experiences of American youth who were sent out on the road by grinding poverty, shattered family relationships, and financially strapped schools that locked their doors. For these young people, danger was a constant companion that could turn deadly in an instant. The book documents the hunger and hardships these youth faced, capturing an appalling spectacle and social problem in America’s history before any effort was made to meet the problem on a nationwide basis by the federal government. Boy and Girl Tramps of America is a work unique in its ability to extend beyond statistical analyses to uncover the opinions, ideas, and attitudes of the boxcar boys and girls. Originally published in 1934, it remains highly relevant to the turbulent moments of the twenty-first century. This reprint features an introduction by scholar Susan Honeyman that puts the work into our current context.

God can take the life of the most insignificant individual or a ministry in a small to moderate-size church and touch the lives of many people for eternity. This is the lesson at the heart of Pastor Bonds' message to the readers of Ain't That Something? Pastor Bonds is retired, having served more than forty-nine years of pastoral ministry in various churches in Nebraska and Texas. He grew up in humble circumstances that some would even call poor during the Great Depression in the 1930's. However, he never thought of himself or his family as being poor. He lived a simple childhood and a rather insignificant adolescence. He takes the reader on the journey of his life from before he was born to the end of his years of pastoral ministry. Pastor Bonds has written his book to encourage those who feel that they are just ordinary and insignificant; not really able to be useful to God in any meaningful way. He wants to encourage the pastors of the thousands of small and moderate-size churches scattered throughout America to see themselves as successful. His message is that God will use anyone who trusts Him.