The Indy Liberation Store is honored to host local author Sid Shoryer about his new book, When Once Destroyed. In taking a dive into his own past, Shroyer found familial and communal truths that were left buried for so long. It’s a familiar story to many in the region, yet the familiarity doesn’t take anything away from either unique elements or the lessons we can generalize as a small town is erased by forces of capital but continues to resist, to disappear.
When Once Destroyed tells the true story of Somerset, a small Indiana town that was erased during a mid-century federal project. It blends personal storytelling with regional history and has connected particularly well with readers interested in local heritage and community identity. This is an author talk that you definitely do not want to miss.
Blurb from the back cover
In the mid-20th century, a small Indiana community named Somerset was wiped from the map—its homes abandoned, its land flooded, its people scattered. Progress demanded sacrifice. And Somerset paid the price.
When Once Destroyed is the true story of that loss—told not as distant history, but as a deeply personal letter from a grandfather to his grandson. Through memory, reflection, and careful research, Sid Shroyer reconstructs a vanished world: its people, its rhythms, and the quiet dignity of a place that once mattered.
But this is more than a story about one town. It is a meditation on what happens when communities are displaced in the name of progress… and what we lose when history is buried along with them. Blending memoir, cultural history, and moral reflection, When Once Destroyed asks a question that still resonates today: What is the true cost of progress—and who gets to decide?
About the author
Sid Shroyer retired in 2022 as a local on-air host of All Things Considered for the NPR affiliate WVPE in the South Bend, Indiana media market. He continues to provide radio essays for the station’s Michiana Chronicles segment, as a member of a group of area writers. They are archived on the WVPE website.
Sid is also retired from the English Department at New Prairie High School, New Carlisle, Indiana, where he developed and taught classes on the Literature of the Vietnam War and the Literature of the Holocaust. He and his wife Judy Firestein Shroyer reside now in both South Bend and Minneapolis.