The Keeper of Lost Children is a story about yet another little known footnote of war told through the poignant stories of three characters. This particular story grew from research the author, Sadqua Johnson, came across while she was researching another book. Mabel Grammer, a journalist and wife of a chief warrant officer stationed in Mannheim, Germany discovered there were hundreds or abandoned biracial babies.conceived during WWII. She and her husband created the Brown Baby Project to place these children in American homes. While I was extremely aware of the hardships faced by the Vietnamese American children (derogatory term in Vietnamese —Bui Doi) born during the long war but never thought about this as a consequence of all wars—children born to native women and abandoned by the soldier fathers. The children in this story were born to German women and Black American soldiers. Imagine how hard this must have living in a country that aspired to the Aryan state. Both the children and their mothers suffered. The women were abandoned by their families, the children sent to orphanages, and the fathers were either unaware, redeployed without notice., or unconcerned. The story of the three characters who are our main protagonists in this novel is captivating and clearly shows the power of one. Ethel Gathers based on Ms. Grammer, is stationed in Germany with her husband after WWII. She had worked as a journalist but wants nothing more than to be a mother. She is, however, infertile. One day, depressed after an afternoon spent with mothers cuddling their babies, she wanders across town and sees a group of children walking with a nun toward an orphanage and she follows them. The children are in desperate need of love and comfort despite the nuns doing the best they can. Ethel learns the plight of these unwanted brown babies and starts volunteering and ultimately adopting a number of them. She develops an adoption program to find homes in America for these children. Ozzie’s story begins in 1948. He is a bright young black man who hopes to be successful in life. He joins the military with the hope of building a career. Unfortunately, he finds the same racism he experienced in Philadelphia that he hoped to escape. Despite scoring first on exams, he is held back. Ozzie is especially disheartened since his experience coincides with Truman’s resolution to integrate the armed forces. He works a job that is well beneath his skills and is unfairly treated by his commanding officer. Prone to soothing himself through drink, he starts going out with a German woman, Jelka. She gives birth to a daughter and Ozzie is resolved to always take care of them but he is reassigned and later unable to find them. Sophia is a young teen. It is 1965 when schools are first integrated. Her story is heartbreaking, more reminiscent of mistreatment of children in The Orphan Train than placed in a loving home. She is a farm hand to her mother and father and lives in marginal conditions. But Sophia is a highly motivated, responsible, loving girl and wins a scholarship to a prestigious boarding school. Although the physical accomodations are far beyond the miserly life she is accustomed to she has mixed experience— the racial taunting and non acceptance of staff and students but also her first experience with real friendship among the few other black children attending the school. Each of the three stories is compelling and you can’t help but feel both their happiness and pain. The dogged work of Ethel, the defeats and rejections felt by both Ozzie and Sophia, the strength within each of them to overcome overwhelming obstacles. Each of their stories felt true and I was definitely immersed. Often times, I have a favorite and am annoyed when I have a favorite character I don’t like leaving them to go to another time and place. I didn’t feel this while reading. I was equally engaged with all of them. They had very different conflicts to deal with as part of a broader problem. I liked the minor characters as well. The dogged determination of Rita, Ozzie’s wife, Jelka and her sister, Sophia’s friends Marcus and Willa. And finally we have a nun running a Catholic orphanage who is kind and has the children’s best interest at heart. These characters layered the stories all in service to the realities of their time. And again, through a historical novel, we are reminded that many of the same issues are with us today. While the ending might have been too pat, there can be satisfaction in moving in a positive direction. |
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