Monument to the children of Babi Yar[/caption]Carol Forsloff - Recent news on missing children has focused on Madeleine McCann who vanished five years ago. Police have raised the possibility the child may still be alive. While the focus is on the problem in modern times, early death or the kidnapping of children presents one of the greatest heartaches in our culture. Our great composers, like Stephen Foster, eloquently spoke of this type of tragedy, one that continues to bring attention to the precious lives we lose and the need to focus on the health and welfare of the innocent.
MSNBC writes that " Madeleine's name has become synonymous with parental despair -- a heartbreaking story that has no end." Madeleine disappeared in Portugal when the family was on vacation. The parents, along with volunteers and aided by the media and police, have been unable to find the child. Now the authorities are offering some hope Madeleine may still be alive.
In the United States there are consistently stories about missing children, some found like Jaycee Duggard, whose story of captivity for many years riveted the nation. Then there is Elan Paltz, a child who went missing in 1979 and inspired the pictures of children who had disappeared and had not been found.
Children are lost in many ways. The United States has among the highest rates of infant mortality among the developed nations of the world, at a rate of seven deaths per thousand, according to 2007 statistics. Furthermore, twice as many black children die than white babies. Also infant mortality is more than one-third higher in the South than in the rest of the country, all while the U.S. spends far more on health care than other nations.
Throughout history musicians, painters and writers of both poetry and prose have translated the news of tragedies that affect people of any era. At the time Stephen Foster wrote the song "Virginia Belle," children worked in farms and factories along with other members of their families who struggled to make a living during hard times. Many children died early from disease and accidents, as medicine did not have the tools to save their lives in those years. They also died from abuse and neglect, a problem that continues today . Who could communicate the emotional pain of losing a child better than those whose particular means of telling stories and news events could relate the feelings as well as the facts.
Stephen Foster's music, while considered antiquated by some and seldom heard in our modern world, had a way of bringing attention to the plight of the hopeless and helpless, as he also wrote of the events of his day, but in a way that immortalizes not just the facts of that time period but also the events that occur today, as the loss of a child represents.
The song, "Virginia Belle," far less known that Foster's songs like "Oh Susannah" and "Jeannie with the Light Brown Hair" speaks of the sorrow parents have when a child is lost. The media today recognizes that most of us relate to that type of loss in some way, as we hold our dear ones close. His song helps us remember the value of a single life, and how the loss of a solitary child has meaning for us all.
