From the Furnace, with Love

'From the Furnace, with Love' is an exploration into the multi-generational influence of Shirley Cavanaugh, a 28-year-old sex worker whose testimonies against corrupt Pittsburgh police brought about the total dismantling and collapse of the revered 1950s Vice and Narcotics Squad. But Shirley Cavanaugh’s life was far more complex and nuanced than the newspaper headlines of the 1950s would have suggested. Shirley was the mother of four children, each of whom possessed a story of abandonment, courage, coincidence, and perseverance. When the stories of these two generations are woven together by a third ... 'From the Furnace, with Love' becomes a three-decade-long journey of familial healing. Nearly a century after it began, Shirley’s story opens into the heart of forgiveness, through the vulnerable exposition of generational trauma.