Award Winning Writer Presents Vivid Account of Growing up During the Great Depression in a Family of 13 Children

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Joseph A. Parzych portrays farm life with humor and love in the memoir Jep’s Place: Hope, Faith, and Other Disasters. The subsistence farm in Gill, Massachusetts, at the end of a dirt road, has no electricity, telephone or running water. The fire in the kitchen stove dies during the night, and in winter frost forms on the children’s bedroom ceilings.

The account includes his stern father’s debacle with a moonshine still and home brew operation during prohibition, memories of Cossacks and hair breadth escapes. Polish is spoken at home and he learns English in first grade. By age 12 he is working and buying all his own clothes. He attends a prestigious prep school as a day student, against his father’s wishes. At age17, he quits school, joins the Army, gets a GED, is honorably discharged, and graduates from high school, prep school and college---the only one in the family to get a degree.

Parzych is a photographer, essayist, former excavating contractor, cooking columnist and the father of four, including a multiply handicapped daughter. He earned a B.S. in Business Administration from Bryant College, attended several other colleges and universities and is a member of the National Honor Society. An award winning writer, he has published in Yankee magazine, Yankee Books, Reader’s Digest, in a writing textbook Process Your Thoughts, and many others publications.

He relates stories of making pets of calves, pigeons, circus pigs (yes, circus pigs) and other farm animals. He recognizes that he was strong minded and that his parents did the best they could with a trying kid, during trying times, under difficult conditions.

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Joseph A. Parzych

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Joseph A. Parzych

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