NOTC President's Award

After traveling around this spring, I arrived home to a pile of mail that included a box which I believed to be a book ordered that I'd forgotten about.

What a nice surprise to open up the box and find a plaque from the National Orphan Train Complex. I had been honored to win this year's President's Award.

I believe in the work of the National Orphan Train Complex, Museum and Research Center. They are working to preserve the stories and artifacts of children who were sent on trains from big cities to rural areas in hopes they would find better lives.

I received the award for my work on writing and illustrating a picture book that is based on a little girl who made that orphan train journey.

The Orphan Train Complex commissioned me two years ago to work on this project and once I started reading the stories of orphan train riders, I fell in love with the project. I'm honored to be working to keep the stories of these children alive and to also have people thinking about how we honor those children by taking care of the children who need our help and care today.

To read the KNCK article about the National Orphan Train Complex President's Award Banquet, Dane G. Hansen Grant Award, and hear part of an interview they did with me, click here.