The Orphans' Nine Commandments

By William Roger Holman

Book Overview

When Roger Bechan was six, his mother packed his suitcase and told him they were going to Oklahoma City to visit an uncle. Instead, she took him to the Oklahoma Society for the Friendless, where he began a long journey through three orphanages and several foster homes. With all the color of the 1930s, this is a story of survival within an impersonal child-care system, a story filled with vivid characters, pathos and surprising humor, and the tenacity of a young boy who longs for a normal home--and can't understand why his mother abandoned him or who his father is. No wonder he and his orphan friends omit the tenth commandment--to "honor your father and mother." As a teenager, the boy finds a home with a supportive couple in a small Oklahoma oil town. Roger Bechan becomes William Holman, who obtains degrees from two universities, marries and raises three sons, and becomes the youngest director of the San Francisco Public Library and an award-winning book designer. Late in life, he discovers the identity of his father--and a new family.

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0875653553
• ISBN13: 9780875653556
• Release Date: October 2007
• Publisher: Texas Christian University Press
• Length: 238 Pages
• Weight: 1.30 lbs.
• Dimensions: 1.0" x 6.3" x 9.3"

Customer Reviews

The Orphans' Nine Commandments

The Orphans' Nine Commandments by William Roger Holman. Mr. Holman was brave to share this very personal and I'm sure emotionally and physically painful childhood with the reader. It is written with such attention to detail that the reader feels as if he is going through young Holman's life with him. The book moved me greatly to the extent of tears on more that one occasion. This is one chapter of American history which is not found in the school text books. Thank you William Roger Holman for sharing your journey with us.

A fascinating story

Once I began reading I couldn't put young Will out of my mind. I put everything else aside until I learned the fate of this boy whose name changed as he was yanked from one home to another. William Holman tells his story with the clipped speech of Oklahoma, bringing to life the stark years of the 1930's and the incredible story of a bewildered and obstinate child.

Orphans' Nine Commandments

The story of a man coming of age under extraordinary circumstances "The Orphans' Nine Commandments" is fascinating, engrossing, well written, and touching. Roger Bechan, the main character, is awesome in that he endured enough depivations, humiliations, heartaches, shocks, and disappointments to swamp a less sturdy person, yet he nourished his gift of spirit through it all managing to find joy, humor, grace, and success. Although his early life held few admirable role models he manages to arrive where he could now well serve to be one. It is good to see a memoir documented with court records, adoption papers, and an "Indenture Contract" under which Roger Bechan was released from the "West Oklahoma Home for White Children" in 1937. A Dickens like story but this is real life. I couldn't put the book down. Betty Ann Altman

The Life and Times of an Oklahoma Orphan

Reading Bill Holman's book brought me great personal pleasure. I am an Oklahoman who also lived in Drumright and Oklahoma City. As he described places and events in both cities, the sights and sounds became alive and I traveled with him on his journey as a young boy trying to survive in a world that he did not choose. He enjoyed great adventures and endured times of great sadness. His story makes you feel every emotion imaginable as he grows up from that child that was abandoned by his mother to the young man that he becomes. This book is an easy read that keeps the reader engaged. It made me laugh and made me cry. What more could you want?

An Unforgettable Orphan

Upfront alert: this commentator watched this book grow from original Ms. to finished publication--a rare treat that works on several levels--as a literary success, a sociological record of orphanage life in 1930s Oklahoma, and the quest for a mother and father whose trails have been carefully hidden. These are no "princes of Oklahoma," but children who struggle for food and affection, who steal their own Christmas tree, play in a cast-off coffin, assist the town madam bury her pet dog, with a boy who fights a system that markets in orphans and who uses Juicy Fruit gum to prove his worth. As readable as a colorful novel, this (as Larry McMurtry says) is an important book, the story of a small boy who overcomes five different names, a succession of "homes," and all his bad angels to achieve national success and solve at least a part of his quest. A truly unforgettable story.