Orphan Train: Hemingford County, Minnesota, 1930–Spruce Harbor, Maine, 2011

by Christina Baker Kline
Christina Baker Kline's historical novel follows two young women searching for a sense of belonging: Molly, a teen navigating the foster system in 2011, and Niamh, an Irish immigrant orphaned on the cusp of the Great Depression. Discover how their lives intersect as you learn these words from Orphan Train.

Here are links to our other lists for the novel: Prologue–Milwaukee Road Depot, Minneapolis, 1929; Albans, Minnesota, 1929–Spruce Harbor, Maine, 2011; Hemingford County, Minnesota, 1930–Spruce Harbor, Maine, 2011; Minneapolis, Minnesota, 1939–Spruce Harbor, Maine, 2011
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Full list of words from this list:

words only definitions & notes
  1. impervious
    not admitting of passage or capable of being affected
    I move through the house like an armored beetle, impervious to Mrs. Grote’s sharp tongue, Harold’s whining, the cries of Gerald Jr., who will never in his life satisfy his aching need to be held.
  2. circumstance
    a condition that accompanies some event or activity
    Mrs. Grote, back there moaning in her bedroom, isn’t so different from my own mam. Both of them overburdened and ill-equipped, weak by nature or circumstance, married to strong-willed, selfish men, addicted to the opiate of sleep.
  3. ordeal
    a severe or trying experience
    I know what an ordeal this will be: no more school, my hair gone, hours of labor, washing the bedsheets .
  4. parasite
    an animal or plant that lives in or on a host
    Then she says, “You brung the parasite into this house.”
  5. vagrant
    a wanderer with no established residence or means of support
    I told Gerald it was too much, bringing a vagrant in this house when Lord knows where she’s been.
  6. vermin
    any of various small animals or insects that are pests
    Snatches of their conversation waft back to me—“trash,” “vermin,” “dirty Irish bog-trotter”—and in a few minutes he comes through the kitchen door to find me on my knees, trying to turn the wringer.
  7. degradation
    a low or downcast state
    I leave a place of degradation and squalor, the likes of which I will never experience again.
  8. endure
    face and withstand with courage
    My da used to say it’s good to test your limits now and then, learn what the body is capable of, what you can endure.
  9. ravenous
    extremely hungry
    But I am so ravenous that at the sight of the biscuit my mouth fills with water.
  10. charity
    a kindly and lenient attitude toward people
    But we can’t all have storybook families, can we, Miss Larsen? The world is not a perfect place, and when we are dependent on the charity of others, we are not always in a position to complain.
  11. violation
    an act that disregards an agreement or a right
    “There was an attempted . . . violation. And Mrs. Grote, coming upon the appalling scene, cast her out. Surely you don’t expect Dorothy to return to that situation, now, do you? Frankly, I wonder why you don’t ask the police to go out there and take a look. It doesn’t sound like a healthy place for the other children there, either.”
  12. predicament
    an unpleasant or difficult situation
    I told her about your—predicament. I felt I needed to explain why I brought you here.
  13. refuse
    food that is discarded, as from a kitchen
    All those children sent on trains to the Midwest—collected off the streets of New York like refuse, garbage on a barge, to be sent as far away as possible, out of sight.
  14. mercy
    a disposition to be kind and forgiving
    When Vivian describes how it felt to be at the mercy of strangers, Molly nods.
  15. inclination
    a characteristic likelihood of or natural disposition
    She knows full well what it’s like to tamp down your natural inclinations, to force a smile when you feel numb.
  16. empathy
    understanding and entering into another's feelings
    The expression of emotion does not come naturally, so you learn to fake it. To pretend. To display an empathy you don’t actually feel. And so it is that you learn how to pass, if you’re lucky, to look like everyone else, even though you’re broken inside.
  17. domination
    power to defeat
    I was born on Indian Island. And I just want to say that what happened to the Indians is exactly like what happened to the Irish under British rule. It wasn’t a fair fight. Their land was stolen, their religion was forbidden, they were forced to bend to foreign domination.
  18. dispose
    throw or cast away
    In truth, though she hasn’t admitted it out loud until now, Molly has virtually given up on the idea of disposing of anything.
  19. significance
    the quality of being important
    Maybe the value is in the process—in touching each item, in naming and identifying, in acknowledging the significance of a cardigan, a pair of children’s boots.
  20. ordinary
    lacking special distinction, rank, or status
    But over and over, Molly begins to understand as she listens to the tapes, Vivian has come back to the idea that the people who matter in our lives stay with us, haunting our most ordinary moments. They’re with us in the grocery store, as we turn a corner, chat with a friend. They rise up through the pavement; we absorb them through our soles.
  21. elusive
    difficult to detect or grasp by the mind or analyze
    The gaps in Vivian’s stories seem to her mysteries she can help solve. On TV once she heard a relationship expert say that you can’t find peace until you find all the pieces. She wants to help Vivian find some kind of peace, elusive and fleeting as it may be.
  22. vertiginous
    having or causing a whirling sensation; liable to falling
    She finds Vivian’s parents’ full names in the passenger records log—Patrick and Mary Power from County Galway, Ireland—and feels a vertiginous thrill, as if fictional characters have suddenly sprung to life.
  23. evoke
    call forth, as an emotion, feeling, or response
    The food she makes, familiar to me from Ireland, evokes a flood of memories: sausages roasting with potatoes in the oven, the tea leaves in Gram’s morning cuppa, laundry flapping on the line behind her house, the faint clang of the church bell in the distance.
  24. strand
    a pattern forming a unity within a larger structural whole
    “See the interlaced strands?” She touched the raised pattern with a knobby finger. “These trace a neverending path, leading away from home and circling back. When you wear this, you’ll never be far from the place you started.”
  25. insubordination
    defiance of authority
    The predicament, you must understand, is that you are an orphan, and that whatever the reality, it looks as if there may be an issue with . . . insubordination.
  26. tolerate
    put up with something or somebody unpleasant
    I don’t want to go into another home where I’m treated like a servant, tolerated only for the labor I can provide.
  27. apathetic
    showing little or no emotion or animation
    The Nielsens are politely curious about me, and I do my best to answer their questions without sounding either desperate or apathetic.
  28. decency
    the quality of conforming to rules of propriety and morality
    I find the rituals comforting—the tried-and-true hymns, sermons by the mild-mannered, slope-shouldered reverend that emphasize decency and good manners.
  29. approval
    a feeling of liking something or someone good
    For the first time in my life, the glow of other people’s approval extends to, and envelops, me.
  30. banish
    drive away
    I note what the girls my age are wearing and the style of their hair and the subject of their conversations, and I work hard to banish my foreignness, to make friends, to fit in.
  31. tarnish
    discoloration of metal surface caused by oxidation
    The claddagh charm, its details obscured by tarnish, becomes three-dimensional again.
  32. affiliation
    a social or business relationship
    I will become their daughter, though I never can bring myself to call them Mother and Father—our affiliation feels too formal for that.
  33. impropriety
    a wrong or indecent act
    But I am so worried I might do something to disappoint the Nielsens that I avoid any situation that might lead to impropriety.
  34. disappointment
    an act that fails to meet someone's expectations
    I never lose the fear that any day Mr. Sorenson could be on the doorstep, telling me that the Nielsens have decided I’m too expensive, too much trouble, or merely a disappointment, and they’ve decided to let me go.
  35. incarnation
    time passed in a particular bodily form
    I’ve viewed my life until now as a series of unrelated adaptations, from Irish Niamh to American Dorothy to the reincarnated Vivian. Each identity has been projected onto me and fits oddly at first, like a pair of shoes you have to break in before they’re comfortable. But with red lipstick I can fashion a whole new—and temporary—persona. I can determine my own next incarnation.
  36. enervating
    causing weakness or debilitation
    She stokes the fire of her hatred, feeding it tidbits about bigoted idiot Dina and spineless mushmouth Ralph, because she knows that just beyond the rage is a sorrow so enervating it could render her immobile.
  37. pusillanimous
    lacking in courage, strength, and resolution
    She knows he’s caught between her and Dina, and utterly unequipped to handle either of them. She almost feels sorry for him, the pusillanimous wretch.
  38. seep
    pass gradually or leak or as if through small openings
    The things that matter stay with you, seep into your skin. People get tattoos to have a permanent reminder of things they love or believe or fear, but though she’ll never regret the turtle, she has no need to ink her flesh again to remember the past.
  39. pretense
    the act of giving a false appearance
    “I’m sorry I came into your house this way. Under false pretenses,” Molly says.
    “Ah, well,” Vivian says. “I suppose we all come under false pretenses one way or another, don’t we?
  40. sycophantic
    attempting to win favor by flattery
    “It hasn’t felt like punishment.” Once upon a time—fairly recently, in fact—Molly would’ve gagged over these words, both because they’re blatantly sycophantic and cringingly sentimental.
Created on Sun May 21 17:38:56 EDT 2017 (updated Tue Apr 09 13:40:41 EDT 2019)

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