Twelve Mighty Orphans
The Inspiring True Story of the Mighty Mites Who Ruled Texas Football
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Twelve Mighty Orphans
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Narrated by:
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Barry Abrams
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By:
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Jim Dent
About this listen
More than a century ago, a school was constructed in Fort Worth, Texas, for the purpose of housing and educating the orphans of Texas Freemasons. It was a humble project that for years existed quietly on a hillside east of town. Life at the Masonic Home was about to change, though, with the arrival of a lean, bespectacled coach by the name of Rusty Russell. Here was a man who could bring rain in the midst of a drought. Here was a man who, in virtually no time at all, brought the orphans' story into the homes of millions of Americans.
In the 1930s and 1940s, there was nothing bigger in Texas high school football than the Masonic Home Mighty Mites - a group of orphans bound together by hardship and death. These youngsters, in spite of being outweighed by at least 30 pounds per man, were the toughest football team around. They began with nothing - not even a football - yet in a few years were playing for the state championship on the highest level of Texas football. This is a winning tribute to a courageous band of underdogs from a time when America desperately needed fresh hope and big dreams.
The Mighty Mites remain a notable moment in the long history of American sports. Just as significant is the depth of the inspirational message. This is a profound lesson in fighting back and clinging to faith.
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-
Undefeated
- Jim Thorpe and the Carlisle Indian School Football Team
- By: Steve Sheinkin
- Narrated by: Mark Bramhall
- Length: 6 hrs and 31 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 258
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 223
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 222
When superstar athlete Jim Thorpe and football legend Pop Warner met in 1904 at the Carlisle Indian Industrial School in Pennsylvania, they forged one of the winningest teams in American football history. Called "the team that invented football", they took on the best opponents of their day, defeating much more privileged schools such as Harvard and Army in a series of breathtakingly close calls, genius plays, and bone-crushing hard work.
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5 out of 5 stars
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I don't even like sports.
- By Melmonie on 03-12-18
By: Steve Sheinkin
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The Secret Game
- A Wartime Story of Courage, Change, and Basketball's Lost Triumph
- By: Scott Ellsworth
- Narrated by: Scott Ellsworth
- Length: 11 hrs and 11 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 53
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Performance4 out of 5 stars 49
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 49
In the wartime fall of 1943, at the little-known North Carolina College for Negroes, Coach John McLendon was on the verge of changing the game forever. Within six months his Eagles would become the highest-scoring college basketball team in America, a fast-breaking, hard-pressing juggernaut that would shatter its opponents by as many as 60 points per game. The last student of James Naismith, basketball's inventor, McLendon had opened the door to its future.
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4 out of 5 stars
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Could Have Been Great
- By Rich Hayami on 05-25-24
By: Scott Ellsworth
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The Boys of Winter
- The Untold Story of a Coach, a Dream, and the 1980 U.S. Olympic Hockey Team
- By: Wayne Coffey
- Narrated by: Kirby Heyborne
- Length: 8 hrs and 38 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 326
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 290
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 290
Once upon a time, they taught us to believe. They were the 1980 US Olympic hockey team, a blue-collar bunch led by an unconventional coach, and they engineered perhaps the greatest sports moment of the 20th century. Their "Miracle on Ice" has become a national fairy tale, but the real Cinderella story is even more remarkable. It is a legacy of hope, hard work, and homegrown triumph. It is a chronicle of everyday heroes who just wanted to play hockey happily ever after.
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5 out of 5 stars
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Great, but...
- By S. B. G. on 02-13-18
By: Wayne Coffey
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Dr. J Unabridged
- The Autobiography
- By: Julius Erving, Karl Taro Greenfeld
- Narrated by: Julius Erving
- Length: 12 hrs and 14 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 133
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 120
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 120
With his flights of improvisation around the basket and his towering afro, Julius Erving became one of the most charismatic (and revolutionary) players basketball has ever known. But while the public has long revered this cultural icon, few have ever known of the double life of Julius Erving. Dr. J traces the inner lives of the nearly perfect player and the imperfect man - and how he has come to terms with both.
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5 out of 5 stars
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I may overrate it, but I’m a hoops junkie!
- By @JWTheBlueprint on 01-29-14
By: Julius Erving, and others
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Their Life's Work
- The Brotherhood of the 1970s Pittsburgh Steelers
- By: Gary M. Pomerantz
- Narrated by: Paul Boehmer
- Length: 16 hrs and 58 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 82
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 72
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 72
The Pittsburgh Steelers of the 1970s won an unprecedented and unmatched four Super Bowls in six years. A dozen of those Steelers players, coaches, and executives have been inducted into the Hall of Fame, and three decades later their names echo in popular memory: "Mean" Joe Greene, Terry Bradshaw, Franco Harris, Mike Webster, Jack Lambert, Lynn Swann, and John Stallworth.
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5 out of 5 stars
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Great Book
- By cap on 07-18-18
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One Shot at Forever
- A Small Town, an Unlikely Coach, and a Magical Baseball Season
- By: Chris Ballard
- Narrated by: Mike Chamberlain
- Length: 8 hrs and 11 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 120
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 112
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 110
In 1971, a small-town high school baseball team from rural Illinois playing with hand-me-down uniforms and peace signs on their hats defied convention and the odds. Led by an English teacher with no coaching experience, the Macon Ironmen emerged from a field of 370 teams to become the smallest school in Illinois history to make the state final, a distinction that still stands. There, sporting long hair, and warming up to "Jesus Christ Superstar", the Ironmen would play a dramatic game that would change their lives forever.
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5 out of 5 stars
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Outstanding.
- By Cartman18 on 08-02-13
By: Chris Ballard
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The Mannings
- The Fall and Rise of a Football Family
- By: Lars Anderson
- Narrated by: Ian Alan Carlsen
- Length: 9 hrs and 48 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 75
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 69
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 68
From New York Times best-selling author Lars Anderson comes a revealing portrait of the first family of American sports. What the Kennedys are to politics, the Mannings are to football. Two generations have produced three NFL superstars: Archie Manning, the Ole Miss hero-turned-New Orleans Saint; his son Peyton, widely considered one of the greatest quarterbacks ever to play the game; and Peyton's younger brother, Eli, who won two Super Bowl rings of his own.
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5 out of 5 stars
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The first family of football
- By Tyler Gordon on 09-08-18
By: Lars Anderson
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Playing Through the Whistle
- Steel, Football, and an American Town
- By: S. L. Price
- Narrated by: Joe Barrett
- Length: 15 hrs and 17 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4 out of 5 stars 66
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Performance4 out of 5 stars 63
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Story4 out of 5 stars 64
Aliquippa, Pennsylvania is famous for two things: the Jones and Laughlin Steel mill, an industrial behemoth that helped win World War II; and football, with a high school team that has produced numerous NFL stars, including Mike Ditka and Darrelle Revis. But the mill, once the fourth largest producer in America, closed for good in 2000. What happens to a town when a dream dies? Does it just disappear?
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5 out of 5 stars
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This is not a football book
- By radchick on 04-19-17
By: S. L. Price
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Dust Bowl Girls
- The Inspiring Story of the Team That Barnstormed Its Way to Basketball Glory
- By: Lydia Reeder
- Narrated by: Virginia Wolf
- Length: 8 hrs and 26 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4 out of 5 stars 73
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Performance4 out of 5 stars 65
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Story4 out of 5 stars 65
At the height of the Great Depression, Sam Babb, the charismatic basketball coach of tiny Oklahoma Presbyterian College, began dreaming. Like so many others, he wanted a reason to have hope. Traveling from farm to farm, he recruited talented, hardworking young women and offered them a chance at a better life: a free college education if they would come play for his basketball team, the Cardinals. Despite their fears of leaving home and the sacrifices faced by their families, the women followed Babb and his dream.
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3 out of 5 stars
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Only A 'Nice' Story
- By Gillian on 01-29-17
By: Lydia Reeder
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The Best Game Ever
- Giants vs. Colts, 1958, and the Birth of the Modern NFL
- By: Mark Bowden
- Narrated by: Phil Gigante
- Length: 6 hrs and 4 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 137
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 57
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 57
On December 28, 1958, the New York Giants and Baltimore Colts met under the lights of Yankee Stadium for that season's NFL Championship game. Football was still greatly over-shadowed by the country's favored pastime - baseball - but the 1958 championship proved to be the turning point for pro football.
On the field and roaming the sidelines were 17 future Hall of Famers, including Colts stars Johnny Unitas, Raymond Berry, and Gino Marchetti, and Giants greats Frank Gifford, Sam Huff, and assistant coaches Vince Lombardi and Tom Landry.
The Best Game Ever is a brilliant portrait of how a single game changed the history of American sports.
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2 out of 5 stars
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What about the other team?
- By Smalls on 11-29-08
By: Mark Bowden
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Boys Will Be Boys
- The Glory Days and Party Nights of the Dallas Cowboys Dynasty
- By: Jeff Pearlman
- Narrated by: Arthur Morey
- Length: 13 hrs and 44 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 621
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Performance4 out of 5 stars 501
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 501
They were America's Team - the high-priced, high-glamour, high-flying Dallas Cowboys of the 1990s, who won three Super Bowls and made as many headlines off the field as on it. Led by Emmitt Smith, the charismatic Deion "Prime Time" Sanders, and Hall of Famers Troy Aikman and Michael Irvin, the Cowboys rank among the greatest of all NFL dynasties.
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1 out of 5 stars
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This is a football book right?
- By Aaron on 12-07-09
By: Jeff Pearlman
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The Cost of These Dreams
- Sports Stories and Other Serious Business
- By: Wright Thompson
- Narrated by: Wright Thompson
- Length: 12 hrs and 27 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 461
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Performance5 out of 5 stars 404
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Story5 out of 5 stars 402
There is only one Wright Thompson. He is, as they say, famous if you know who he is: his work includes the most-read articles in the history of ESPN (and it's not even close) and has been anthologized in the Best American Sports Writing series ten times, and he counts John Grisham and Richard Ford among his ardent admirers. But to say his pieces are about sports, while true as far as it goes, is like saying Larry McMurtry's Lonesome Dove is a book about a cattle drive.
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5 out of 5 stars
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Just great
- By ACK on 06-02-19
By: Wright Thompson
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The Game: Harvard, Yale, and America in 1968
- By: George Howe Colt
- Narrated by: George Newbern
- Length: 10 hrs and 56 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 67
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 59
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 59
On November 23, 1968, near the end of a turbulent and memorable year, there was a football game that would also prove turbulent and memorable: the season-ending clash between Harvard and Yale. Both teams entered undefeated and, technically at least, came out undefeated. The final score was 29-29. To some of the players on the field, it was a triumph; to others a tragedy. George Howe Colt’s The Game is the story of that iconic American year, as seen through the young men who lived it and were changed by it.
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5 out of 5 stars
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More than a game
- By Hebern on 11-05-18
By: George Howe Colt
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Arnie & Jack
- Palmer, Nicklaus, and Golf's Greatest Rivalry
- By: Ian O' Connor
- Narrated by: Alpha Trivette
- Length: 12 hrs and 28 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 85
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 68
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 68
Surprisingly, one of sport’s most contentious, complex, and defining clashes played out not in the boxing ring or at the line of scrimmage but on the genteel green fairways of the world’s finest golf courses. Arnie and Jack. Palmer and Nicklaus. Their 50-year duel, in both the clubhouse and the boardroom, propelled each to the status of American icon and pushed modern golf to the heights and popularity it enjoys today. Yet for all the ink that has been spilled on these two essential golf figures individually, no one has ever examined their relationship in this way.
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2 out of 5 stars
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No Match
- By Craig Black on 05-11-15
By: Ian O' Connor
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Slow Getting Up
- A Story of NFL Survival from the Bottom of the Pile
- By: Nate Jackson
- Narrated by: Nate Jackson
- Length: 8 hrs and 19 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 281
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Performance4 out of 5 stars 253
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 256
Nate Jackson’s Slow Getting Up is an unvarnished and uncensored memoir of everyday life in the most popular sports league in America - and the most damaging to its players - the National Football League. After playing college ball at a tiny Division III school, Jackson, a receiver, signed as a free agent with the San Francisco 49ers, before moving to the Denver Broncos. For six seasons in the NFL as a Bronco, he alternated between the practice squad and the active roster, eventually winning a starting spot - a short, tenuous career emblematic of the average pro player.
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3 out of 5 stars
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Almost unlistenable...AND I'M A DENVER DIEHARD!
- By JROD2133 on 07-02-14
By: Nate Jackson
What listeners say about Twelve Mighty Orphans
Average customer ratingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
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Overall5 out of 5 stars
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Performance3 out of 5 stars
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Story5 out of 5 stars
- Amazon Customer
- 08-06-21
Great book
Not a fan of the narration, though. The narrator has weird accents for the characters in the book. He makes the characters sound dumb which they are not. Plus he tries to give them a southern Texas twang that’s not what Texans sound like at all. But other than that the storyline is excellent and I wouldn’t avoid the book just because of the narration.
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Overall5 out of 5 stars
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Performance5 out of 5 stars
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Story5 out of 5 stars
- Darryle
- 06-05-21
Awesome story
Truly captivating and inspiring story, listened straight thru to the end, it was that good!
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Overall5 out of 5 stars
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Performance5 out of 5 stars
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Story5 out of 5 stars
- Damian McKeon
- 06-14-21
Great story!!
What a great story! I highly recommend to anyone who is interested in football history!! Great narrator too!
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2 people found this helpful
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Overall4 out of 5 stars
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Performance4 out of 5 stars
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Story5 out of 5 stars
- Anonymous User
- 01-23-20
Enjoyed Listening
This was my first audio book so dont have anything to compare it to. I did throughly enjoyed listening. I thought it was well done.
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1 person found this helpful
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Overall5 out of 5 stars
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Performance5 out of 5 stars
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Story5 out of 5 stars
- Linda M. Terry
- 07-10-21
Mighty Mites
This was a wonderful book, well written and all true!! I loved the football boys from the Masonic Homr. I
Definitely had a crush on Coach Russell
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Overall5 out of 5 stars
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Performance5 out of 5 stars
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Story5 out of 5 stars
- R. E. McGee
- 12-10-19
HomeBoys
Rings true to me, as I was a HomeBoy in the 60’s and heard all of the stories of the 1930s Mighty Mites.
Was a tough school when I was there, though we never fielded a team that came close to matching the caliber of “The 12 Mighty Orphans”.
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1 person found this helpful
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Overall4 out of 5 stars
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Performance4 out of 5 stars
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Story5 out of 5 stars
- Don
- 07-31-21
Great book if you are a Texas football fan.
I enjoy true life stories which made this book very interesting. I haven't seen the movie.
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Overall5 out of 5 stars
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Performance5 out of 5 stars
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Story5 out of 5 stars
- Stephenie Compher
- 02-09-23
Great Book
One of the most FUN books I’ve ever read. These scrappy, tough little cusses will have you laughing and crying.
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Overall5 out of 5 stars
- Anonymous User
- 12-19-19
Great story
Will definitely listen to again. The story is compelling at every chapter knowing that it is true makes it even more compelling. I will study this more in hopefully it is a movie someday . A great story told greatly.
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1 person found this helpful
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Overall5 out of 5 stars
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Performance5 out of 5 stars
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Story5 out of 5 stars
- Linda
- 11-19-21
elmer
good true story, love football and they were very mighty hope everyone enjoys it like I did
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