Friday, April 01, 2011
'We were not orphans: Stories from the Waco State School'
I heard a fascinating if disturbing interview on NPR this morning with the author of a new book out on the history the Waco State School - a reformatory created by the Legislature in 1923 and closed in the late '70s - with the same title as this post, including allegations of extremist brutality (e.g., sexual molestation and beatings with baseball bats). But there are also many positive memories and stories of redemption from school alumni, says the author, and the oral histories are supplemented by extensive documentary research. See early reviews here and here, as well as this video preview of what appears to be an extraordinary work of historical and archival research, performed just in time before those who could supply first-hand accounts are no longer around to tell their stories.
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9 comments:
I'm struck by the fact that the children shown in the pictures are all white. What happened to poor black or Mexican children at the time?
If this place was such a bastion of state sponsored child abuse you should learn what tyc had going 30 miles west of Waco in the little backwoods redneck town of Gatesville.
Texas had laws about white kids comingling with “colored” kids. In Gatesville the black kids were kept in a totally separate facility by the river and the Mexican were kept in separate dorms in the white facility, Hilltop.
I wonder if Waco State Home is haunted like Gatesville and still has kid buried around it in unmarked graves?
It sounds like a very powerful novel.
9:58, it's nonfiction, actually; oral and documentary history.
Sheldon needs some God Love in his life and learn to forgive and move on. I went to school with the kids from one of the homes back in the 60 and 70 and none of them have such bitterness. My best friend lived there and I even spent the weekend with her. Most of them come back every year for a reunion. I guess they were just glad to have a roof over their head, food on the table and clothes to wear. They never talk about things like that going on here. He just sounds like someone who has a chip on his shoulder that can't let it go. I pray for you Sheldon that God will give you peace and forgiveness.
I was in the home with two of my sisters. I had the mess beat out of me, the third day at the home.
the dorm parent wanted to make a point out of me. Me and my two sisters , spend six years in the home.
kids was raped, beat, molested.
I went on to spend fifteen years in the united states marines, graduated with a master in computer science/electronic.
I was lucky.
my two sisters was not.
I was there i assure u there was a mix-black-white-Latino-Indian- ect no race was spared the rath of this place
The waco state home new of gatesville and gainsville they used your location to scare us and we had a few from your place come through our doors--
U should of been there u would sing a different tune - every place like this has its pets u would of made a a good pet.of course none of us talked about the crap that went on --i would have loved for u to meet one of the baseball bat weilding witches that worked there-- climb back into to your hole
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