The Booth Girls

This program was recorded on April 20th, 2021.

Half a century ago when Minnesota girls “got in trouble,” they often found themselves banished from daily life, awaiting the outcome of their pregnancies at the Salvation Army's Booth Memorial Hospital in Saint Paul. Scholar Kim Heikkila’s research into the history of this home for unwed mothers was prompted, in part, by the discovery of painful secrets in her own family’s past. 

Kim Heikkila’s most recent book is Booth Girls: Pregnancy, Adoption, and the Secrets We Kept (Minnesota Historical Society Press, 2021).

This series is co-sponsored by the Osher Lifelong Learning Institute of the University of MN with the financial support of Minnesota's Arts and Cultural Heritage Fund.

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