History is a subject that can become dull and routine if you are only reading about it.  The last thing I want to do is make history boring in our school so I am very excited to have found Heirloom Audio Productions.  Heirloom Audio Productions is a company with a passion and love of history.  Their priority is bringing real history to life for their listeners. 

Heirloom Audio Productions strive to tell the stories of true Christian heroes while teaching strong moral values.  Their audio dramas are based on the popular book series The Extraordinary Adventures of G.A. Henty.  George Alfred Henty, better known as G.A. Henty was a real man who is known for his contributions to literature as a historical and adventure novelist.  Although he died in 1902, his books are still widely read today.  They are filled with themes of bravery, loyalty, family, and happy endings while featuring moral values like loyalty, courage, honesty, and perseverance.  So you can see why Heirloom Audio Productions would base their audio dramas on this series.

With Lee In Virginia is an adventurous audio drama featuring the Civil War.  This story follows the life of Vincent Wingfield during this time period.  Vincent lives in Virginia and is a proud Virginian.  Even though his family owns slaves, he believes in treating them kindly as people rather than treating them as property.  When Vincent's friends enlist for the Confederate Army, he rushes to join them.  They are young and believe it will be a great adventure.  Not long after they enlist and go through boot camp, they learn that war is not an adventure, but a real struggle.  As Vincent and his friends meet and fight alongside great Southern Generals like “Stonewall” Jackson and Robert E. Lee, they learn the character traits required in war and life.  Vincent learns about honor, loyalty, integrity, and relying on God. 

With Lee in Virginia features over two hours of audio drama to listen to.  It drew us in and had us on the edge of our seat waiting to find out what would happen next to Vincent and his friends.  The cast features some of our favorite actors and voices we recognize like Kirk Cameron and Sean Astin.  If listening to the audio drama is not enough, Heirloom Audio offers a free e-study guide and discussion starter to accompany this audio drama when you purchase the two CD set for $29.97 plus shipping and handling.  The e-study guide is filled with questions to check for listening and understanding along with questions to start discussions.  It also features vocabulary, pictures from the time period, and a Bible study that goes along with the themes and character traits in the audio drama.  This resources was very helpful while we were listening to With Lee in Virginia because I used the questions to make sure my son was listening and to discuss what he heard. 

Our family truly enjoyed listening to With Lee in Virginia from Heirloom Audio Productions.  It is another great resource from them.  I had only planned to have my son listen to it as part of his study of the Civil War this year, but soon found my daughter sitting in listening to it too.  This title captured our attention the first time and every time we have listened to it since then.  We truly feel like we are right there experiencing the action with Vincent and that is why we enjoy listening to it time and time again.  We highly recommend With Lee in Virginia and Heirloom Audio Productions.

-Product review by Cassandra Holdeman, The Old Schoolhouse® Magazine, LLC, March, 2017