Belle of Calhoun

€ 8,62

Orphaned and abandoned at age 4, Belle knew one, and only one name until she was taken in at the home of widowed Mrs. Mueller, and she was happy and proud of the family name her "new momma" bestowed. She was abandoned yet again, however, a year later, when Mrs. Mueller died of heart failure and Belle was placed in an orphanage in St. Louis. There, she would meet her life-long friend and older "sister" Izzy and begin to develop the inner resilience she would need to cope with the many future blows she would encounter.

After a foster home in Calhoun County, Illinois was arranged for her, she traveled on the steamboat Belle of Calhoun to the home which would be hers for the next several years. There, she found the love of a mother with Mayme Follett, who cherished her as the child she was never able to have. Belle needed every bit of her developing strength, however, to cope with the anger and rejection of her foster father, Asa Follett.

When Belle started school, she met two brothers, Oscar and Omer Riley, who would provide an enduring friendship and safety from her foster father, and one of whom she would marry, her life-long love. She began to develop the inner strength of steel and a resolve which would carry her through the rest of her life.