The Butterbox Babies
PearlEliot
あらすじ
This book tells a dark tale of a maternity home in Nova Scotia that was owned and managed by a couple. Their business became known as the Ideal Maternity Home. The home charged extremely high prices, for instance price for an abortion was as high as $500.The women in that area at that time made about $8 a week and had no option but to work for the Young's until they were able to foot their bills. Legal contracts were been signed by the unwed mothers, giving William and Lila Young the legal authority over their babies and their adoptions. The home soon became a center for all kinds of illicit adoptions across Canada and the United States of America. As at this time, there wasn't a legalized adoption procedure across religious environments by the US laws thus leaving a lot of Jewish families with no other option for adoption. It was later discovered was that the Youngs would purposely starve "unmarketable" babies to death by feeding them only molasses and water, the infants would usually last only two weeks. Babies who died were disposed of in small wooden grocery boxes, typically used for dairy products. Hence the name Butterbox Babies. The babies were buried on the property, adjacent to a nearby cemetery, at sea or sometimes burned in the homes furnace.