When War Was Heck

Product Description

Today, grown men have man caves in which to take refuge. William Henry had his thinking tree, where he could hide amongst the leaves on his special limb, spying on people in the street or talking to an unseen being about his hopes and dreams.

It was wartime mid-1940s, and this tree served him well as his place of refuge. Occasionally, he allowed his friend Peanut to sit with him in his thinking tree. There, they would devise plans and plot against both real and imagined enemies.

The years were filled with typical boyhood adventures: swimming, baseball, basketball, and snowball fights. Intermingled among the wreckage of war were narrow escapes from bullies and monsters on the home front. Boyhood war games were prompted by newsreels and Hollywood movies. In William and Peanut’s war, the Allied Forces always won and wounds were never fatal.

An entertaining history lesson? You’ll find one in this clever tale—packed full of facts and humor . . . all from the unique perspective of a ten-year-old boy.

Read more about the second book in this duo, The Afterglow of War: Lessons Learned.

Additional Information

Phil Emmert left a secure job at Dow Chemical Company in 1970 to enroll at Johnson Bible College in Tennessee. After graduation at age 37, he became a full-time minister. Phil continued to preach and was a social worker in the Department of Social Services in North Carolina. He later became a counselor in the county school system in North Carolina. While in this position, at the age of sixty-three, he began to write motivational thoughts for teachers and staff in the school system. He is the father of three sons and a daughter. He has eleven grandchildren.

Phil’s many experiences with young people as a father, grandfather, minister, children’s social worker, and counselor have contributed greatly to his writings. As a counselor, he took a special interest in fourth- and fifth-graders. He observed that many of these children were not fond of history, focusing instead on current adventure books.

Because of this, When War Was Heck was born. Phil began to write about his hometown of Lebanon, Indiana, during the Second World War, from the perspective of a ten-year-old boy. The characters are real, although the names may be changed and the events out of sequence. He adds the imaginations of a child to this story as well.

Phil Emmert combines easy reading with history, and seasons the story with homespun bits of humor and nostalgia in When War Was Heck. Phil hopes you’ve enjoyed these adventures including Peanut, Mary Anne, and Buck the border collie . . . and the events that influenced Phil’s life as a young child.