Official Website of Author
BOB OVERSTREET
MY STORY
Born on March 18, 1947, Bob Overstreet grew up in the San Fernando Valley, north of Los Angeles. His parents were Martha, who helped to support the family while raising two boys, and his father, James, born in rural Georgia, an enthusiastic storyteller and self-educated man.
Around 1957, while driving east on vacation, they paused briefly at the Little Bighorn National Monument in Montana. On an overcast morning beside the road, they gazed up at scattered marble monuments on the grassy hillside where George Armstrong Custer and more than two hundred of his men had died, while Robert’s father told the story of Custer’s Last Stand.
Later, still haunted by his father’s story, Robert developed a fascination with history and, encouraged by his parents, became an avid reader of books about many times, places, and events.
Graduating from the University of California at Los Angeles with a Bachelor’s Degree in Political Science, he married Kathleen Clancy, who raised their son, Peter, while he pursued a career in residential construction, rising from laborer to Director of Construction Operations by the time he retired in 2009. Over the years, he never lost his interest in storytelling or history.
In the fall of 2009, Robert and Kathleen shared a road trip that included a visit to Yellowstone National Park. While there, he thought about his long-ago visit to Little Bighorn and persuaded Kathleen to accompany him on a side trip to the battlefield.
Although he had read many accounts of Custer’s Last Stand, Robert now encountered the story of the battle’s survivors, a story usually reduced to a few pages in the books he read. Fascinated, he began researching this other battle of Little Bighorn, finding books and newspaper interviews detailing the memories of the survivors, both White and Native American. It was then that he dreamed of writing the story of the two-day siege at Little Bighorn and its effects on those who survived.
Robert formed a partnership with Marian Branch, an old family friend and professional editor with a Master’s Degree in English from the University of California at Los Angeles. Her tireless editing, mentoring, and insights into the Native American viewpoint and the causes and effects of post-traumatic stress disorder, enabled him to realize his dream.
He lost his father twenty-eight years ago, but still remembers him lying on the floor, his head propped up on one arm, reading books about Egyptian history.
Robert, with Marian’s participation, has now begun work on the 3,200-year-old story of a young Egyptian queen.
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MY BOOKS
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A career Army officer, still mourning the loss of his beloved wife, finds himself hunted in the press—blamed for the death of his commanding officer, three years after the most famous engagement of the Indian Wars. Believing that truth will out, Marcus Reno requests that the Army hold a Court of Inquiry to investigate his own actions at the Battle of Little Bighorn.
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Driven by their commanding officer, George Armstrong Custer, until they arrive at the battlefield at noon on June 25, 1876, exhausted and played out, the 7th Cavalry Regiment is then ordered to immediately attack an enemy that outnumbers them five to one. Major Marcus Reno soon finds himself in command of the majority of the regiment and, separated from Custer and his two hundred and twenty-five men, sets up a defensive position from which they resist an overwhelming enemy force for two blood-soaked days.
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On the third day, the terrible truth about Custer and his men is learned during a reconnaissance of their grizzly battlefield.
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Three years later, Marcus Reno, suffering from PTSD and alcoholism, strives to defend his character and his honor against the press, a vengeful widow, and hostile witnesses.
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Calling upon eyewitness accounts, ONE WHO HEARD recounts Reno’s story using scenes of the Battle of Little Bighorn and the court of inquiry.
Sample Readings
