"What would it have been like to be a sixteen-year-old girl in 1925, unmarried and pregnant? In those days, society was cruel to a young woman in this situation. Family members often turned their backs out of embarrassment. The young woman was disgraced and ostracized. The child born out of wedlock was tarnished for life unless secretly adopted. Options were few. Abortion was illegal, expensive, and extremely risky, ignoring any moral issues. Scared and ashamed, many girls were sent to "visit" family in another city or states until the problem went away. A well-kept secret from society, over 100,000 of these young women were sent to Kansas City, Missouri. They traveled, mostly by train, to facilities like The Willows Maternity Sanitarium to hide their dilemma. The Willows was one of the largest homes in America for unwed, pregnant girls to live in seclusion. Months later they would return home empty handed to carry on as though nothing ever happened. They physical pain and trauma were over but the emotional wounds were never healed or forgotten. This is the incredible, true story of The Willows Maternity Sanitarium, the Haworth family who were savvy business owners yet deeply compassionate to these unfortunate girls, and the voices of several whose lives were touched by The Willows."--back cover.

The astonishing untold history of the million and a half women who surrendered children for adoption due to enormous family and social pressure in the decades before Roe v. Wade. “It would take a heart of stone not to be moved by the oral histories of these women and by the courage and candor with which they express themselves.” —The Washington Post “A remarkably well-researched and accomplished book.” —The New York Times Book Review “A wrenching, riveting book.” —Chicago Tribune In this deeply moving and myth-shattering work, Ann Fessler brings out into the open for the first time the hidden social history of adoption before Roe v. Wade - and its lasting legacy. An adoptee who was herself surrendered during those years and recently made contact with her mother, Ann Fessler brilliantly brings to life the voices of more than a hundred women, as well as the spirit of those times, allowing the women to tell their stories in gripping and intimate detail.

The Story of the Willows Maternity Sanitarium and the Adoption Hub of America. For the readers of Orphan Train comes the true story of a second wave of humanity that traveled to the Midwest by train. Not well documented in American history, over 100,000 pregnant, unwed young women traveled mostly by train to Kansas City - known as the Adoption Hub of America - in the early- to mid-1900s.They would live in one of several maternity facilities before giving birth, signing their babies over for adoption and returning home empty handed and heartbroken. One of these facilities was The Willows Maternity Sanitarium, known as the "Ritz" or "Waldorf" of the maternity hospitals. It truly was a Mansion on a Hill and one of the largest of such facilities in America, this is the incredible, true story of The Willows and the compassionate family, yet savvy business owners, who started and operated the seclusion "home" from 1905 until its closing in 1969. With over 35,000 girls passing through its doorway, tales abound of Willows' children questioning the "who" and "why" as they search for answers to their separation. Changed laws and DNA testing are sparking reunions to happen more and more every day. The second part of the book "Voices of The Willows" includes moving stories of those whose lives were touched and changed forever by The Willows.

In The Lost Coin, Stephen Rowley shares his lifelong journey—searching for his birth parents, seeking his true identity, and discovering his soul’s calling. We join him when, as a boy growing up in Iowa, he visits Chicago for the first time and is shocked by blatant racial segregation and sprawling urban poverty. We see Stephen as a young athlete sustaining a life-changing injury, then becoming radicalized at the University of Wisconsin, entering the field of education at Stanford, and becoming a visionary school administrator before being fired by a vindictive Silicon Valley school board. He plays golf with a Tibetan lama, and experiences transcendence in a vivid dream, ultimately becoming a psychotherapist in his sixties. We witness the heart-rending scene when he and his wife adopt their own son, and we join him for a poignant reunion with his birth mother, who, it turns out, had desperately hoped he might appear in her life after she’d given him up for adoption. As we accompany Stephen Rowley on this adventurous and reflective journey, we come to understand more deeply the trauma engendered when separating mother from child, and the unspoken restlessness and yearning for connection many adoptees feel. “It is my hope,” he writes, that we all “may discover the unique capacity within us to heal and even thrive, not in spite of the wounds we carry, but because of them.”

The True Story of a Young Man's Journey in Guatemala "About twenty miles from the border, we noticed cars being pulled over to the side of the road. There were several armed men in military camouflage clothing out in the road, stopping traffic. We were terrified especially after the accusation and warning at the customs office." KelLee Parr tells his story as he accompanied four other young college graduates on their three-year volunteer service with Mennonite Central Committee. The five drove two pickup trucks from Pennsylvania to Guatemala to start their work with the indigenous people. They observed first hand one of the most trying times during the civil war in Guatemala. This book, a part of a series, covers the first nine months of the lifechanging experiences from the fall of 1979 until the summer of 1982. The story reveals the intimate dealings with culture shock, new awareness of others less fortunate, and introspective understanding of who are true Christian servants.