Eight boys from the rural community of Holley, New York, died fighting in Vietnam. All went to the same high school where the average graduating class consisted of just 30 students. This is believed to be one of the highest casualty rates per capita of any town and school in the United States. The 'Holley boys' were awarded 40 medals for combat and valor including seven Purple Hearts, the Bronze Star, Silver Star and the Vietnamese Cross for Gallantry. But they were more than soldiers and heroes. They played Little League, were Boy Scouts, went to sock-hops and performed in the high school marching band. But they also drove hot-rods, drank beer, smoked, and brawled. They weren't angels. They were boys--once. Now, nearly 50 years later, their stories are finally told. Drawing upon over 60 interviews with family members, access to personal letters, diaries, newspaper accounts of the day and after action combat reports, we learn not only about the lives of these boys but also about a seldom seen slice of American society and a remarkable small town you probably never heard of, before that damn war changed everything.

Vietnam Reflection: The Untold Story of the Holley Boys

Biographies & Memoirs

Keene, Michael T.

Leaders & Notable People

Ad-Hoc Productions

The Art of Directing

Arts & Photography

Kirk, John W.

Performing Arts

The Erie Canal delivered people to important places for important reasons, like Susan Cady Stanton and Lucretia Mott to Seneca Falls for history's first women's convention, to Rochester to meet and support abolitionists Frederick Douglass and Harriet Tubman, to witness the Fox Sisters summon spirits and their eerie knockings, or maybe people on the temperance bandwagon hurrying to the Burned Over District so Charles Finney could save their souls. It was a time of intense individual focus and enlightened change in the ways in which people communicated. It was as if a bolt of electricity struck western New York, lighting it up as fertile ground for ideas and lifestyles that had never been expressed or attempted before. It was a time of religious re-birth, ongoing social reform, and making one's life the best it could be in the present, in the future... and even the great beyond.

The Psychic Highway: How the Erie Canal Changed America

History

Americas

In 1848 famine gripped Ireland. Nearly a million people would die of starvation and typhoid fever. A million more Irish would abandon their homeland and come to America. Many settled in the area of Lower Manhattan called Five Points, infamous for its squalor, gang violence and disease. By the end of the Civil War, an estimated 30,000 homeless children roamed the streets of New York. They slept in alleyways, under bridges, in packing boxes and even in sewers. They survived by resorting to petty crime, prostitution, and by selling newspapers for a penny a piece. In response to this crisis, the age of orphan asylums began, culminating in one of the most improbably and audacious episodes in American history. Called the Orphan Train Movement, it endeavored to save these children lost to the streets by heroes who fought for their liberation. This is their story...

Abandoned: The Untold Story of the Orphan Trains

Keene, Michael

THE YEAR WAS 1869, HER NAME WAS MARY ROTE. ...SHE ARRIVED BY STEAMBOAT AT OVID LANDING, SHACKLED AT THE WRISTS AND TRANSPORTED BY ARMED GUARDS..... Mary Rote HAD SPENT the previous TEN YEARS CHAINED TO A WALL IN MADISON COUNTY, New York OFTEN NAKED AND SUSPENDED BY HER THUMBS. DESCRIBED AS DEFORMED AND DEMENTED, SHE WOULD BECOME WILLARD INSANE ASYLUMS.... FIRST PATIENT 127 YEARS LATER IN 1996 THE WILLARD INSANE ASYLUM WOULD FINALLY SHUTTER ITS DOORS WHEREAPON A HORRIFYING DISCOVERY WAS MADE..... BURIED NEAR THE FACILITY WERE OVER 5700 BODIES.... LYING IN UNMARKED GRAVES.....ALL FORMER WILLARD PATIENTS ***DRAWING UPON CONFIDENTIAL HOSPITAL ARCHIVES, PRIVATE PATIENT LETTERS AND NEWSPAPER ACCOUNTS OF THE DAY, I WILL NOW TAKE YOU ON A JOURNEY INSIDE A WORLD OF MADNESS. ***WHAT TERRIBLE SECRETS WERE UNCOVERED AT ROLLING HILLS ASYLUM? ***WHO WAS THE GRAVE DIGGER LAWRENCE AND WHAT WAS FOUND BURIED NEAR THE ROCHESTER INSANE ASYLUM?-- ***WHAT HAPPENED TO THE BEAUTIFUL NELLIE BLY INSIDE THE LUNATIC ASYLUM ON BLACKWELL ISLAND-- ***WHAT WAS THE NOTORIOUS DEVICE 'THE UTICA CRIB' USED FOR? ***WHO HAUNTs THE BUFFALO INSANE ASYLUM even TO THIS DAY? SHOCKING TALES OF NEGLECT, ABUSE AND EVEN TORTURE WILL BE REVEALED HERE SOME FOR THE FIRST TIME... BUT ALSO WE WILL HEAR OF REMARKABLE STORIES, OF INSPIRATION, HOPE AND HEALING

Madhouse: The Hidden History of Insane Asylums in 19th Century New York

The women who serve as the subjects for this book, all share compelling stories. Most of the women in Keene's book are from North Central New York living along the Erie Canal in small, isolated rural communities. Some of the women chronicled in the book include, Lizzie Halliday, convicted of murdering nine of her own family members. Catherine Claus, who boasted of killing 15 infants in her care, Caroline D. Sorgenfrie, charged with the murder of her four husbands', and Ella Holdridge, the fourteen year old thrill killer who enjoyed looking at her victims because, "They looked so nice dead."

Question of Sanity: The True Story of Female Serial Killers in 19th Century New York

Non fiction account of thirteen true murder mysteries that occurred in 19th century New York including the Tourture Tree, the Batavia women who murdered her entire family and the strange murder of Anna Schumacher.

Murder, Mayhem, and Madness: 150 Years of Crime and Punishment in Western New York

See the best price to sell, buy or rent books by the Ad-Hoc Productions publisher. BookScouter helps to compare book prices from 25+ online bookstores and 30+ buyback vendors with a single search.

Books by Ad-Hoc Productions