Tom Dolan Timeline and Summary

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• As a young boy, Tom grows up hearing his mom's stories about her family and helping her with chores on their shabby farm.
• When Tom is eight, he notices how hard his mother works, and he starts doing extra chores to help.
• Tom talks to Birdy about wanting to improve his family's life. He gets the idea of moving the Breen barn to his family's property.
• Several years later, when Tom is thirteen, Birdy takes Tom up to the Breen place to see the barn, where an old lady points a shotgun right at him.
• No worries. It's just Widow Breen, and she invites the guys in for tea and cookies. She also reads Tom's cards and tells him that in the future he'll quit school, make a little money, and eventually get a whole lot of money.
• Tom quits school and gets a job at a mill for a whopping twenty-five cents a day. He starts to fit in with the mill dudes and save money. Parts one and two: check.
• Christmastime comes. It's Tom's first one with money to spend on presents.
• Just before Christmas, there's a blizzard, making Tom's daily walk home from work pretty scary, like some kind of hardcore survival training for a Boy Scout badge. He makes it, though.
• The mill has a little office Christmas party, and Tom gets his first taste of whiskey (his thoughts—blech!) and a half-dollar bonus, which he uses to buy Birdy's Christmas present.
• Polly Ann, Birdy, Cissie-Mae, and Ellie all love their presents from Tom. Happy holidays, kid.
• In late February, Tom goes up to the Breen place to check on the barn, where he finds Widow Breen holed up alone in her kitchen. He is troubled by Mrs. Breen's condition, but she refuses any help other than having Tom bring in firewood.
• Tom feels bad in April when he hears of Mrs. Breen's death and wonders if could have done more. He tells Ox and Mr. Hook about his last visit with the Widow Breen.
• Tom has to tell the sheriff and coroner about his visit as well.
• Tom goes with the sheriff, coroner, Joe Hemphill, and the undertaker up to the Breen place to investigate the death. He and the sheriff notice someone has been rummaging through the drawers.
• Tom gives his testimony at the death inquest, attends Mrs. Breen's burial, and talks with Birdy about what will happen to the barn. When Birdy says that the county will likely sell it for the price of taxes if no relative comes to claim it, Tom begins to think he may be able to afford it.
• Thinking about the barn on his property makes Tom realize how shabby his family's house looks, so he decides to fix it up. Buying the supplies puts a huge dent in Tom's savings, but he eventually stops worrying about that, thinking that he will be able to replenish his savings by the time the Breen property would come up for sale.
• Tom goes to see a lawyer, Billy-Bob Baxter, at Birdy's suggestion, to get more details on the county sale of the Breen place. Billy-Bob finds out that the place won't go up for sale until April, or maybe even April of the following year.
• Christmas comes again, and this year, Mr. Hook stops by and gives Tom a secondhand book on carpentry.
• Tom studies the carpentry book all winter and then goes up to the Breen place to measure out the barn. A man there tells Tom to stop nosing around the property. Birdy later tells Tom the man is Yantis Flancher, looking for Bert's money with his two no-good brothers.
• In May, Tom and Birdy decide where they'll put the barn when Tom buys it, and they spend the summer evenings and Sundays moving the stones they'll need for the foundation.
• Time for a plot twist! Tom doesn't get the title to the Breen place. Billy-Bob tells him that Ab Lambert has purchased it, probably fronting the money for someone.
• Polly Ann sees how disappointed Tom is and gives him a pep talk. Thanks, Mom.
• Tom finds out through Billy-Bob that Mr. Armond bought the Breen property, and Billy-Bob advises Tom to make Mr. Armond an offer on the barn in the spring.
• Tom waits through the winter and makes his offer to Mr. Armond, who accepts it. Tom finally owns the barn. Sweet!
• Tom and Birdy make a plan to move the barn right away, working in the evenings after Tom's mill job and all day on Sundays.
• As the barn work chugs along, things happen that remind Tom of the hidden Breen money: the Flanchers come back around to question Tom about his work; Tom notices something weird about the hook for the barn's door; and Polly Ann tells a story about getting in trouble with Mrs. Breen for peeking through the barn window one night when she was a little girl.
• Tom figures the money must be under a strip of the old barn floor, but he holds off on looking for it. He makes a plan with Polly Ann to go up and look for it on a cold, dark night using back roads so no one will suspect them.
• Tom and Birdy begin building the barn back up on the Dolan property, and Tom makes the arrangements for his barn-raising to get the frame up.
• Tom's barn-raising goes great. The one not-so-great part is that Yantis Flancher shows up. No one likes that guy.
• Still, that gives Tom the idea to go up to the Breen property that night after the barn-raising, before the Flanchers have more time for snooping.
• Tom and Polly Ann wait for nightfall and then drive through the countryside to the Breen place, where Tom finds two chests hidden beneath the old barn floor.
• Tom and Polly Ann take the chests to Billy-Bob's, and they find more than $9,000. Cha-ching!
• Billy-Bob meets Tom at the bank the next day to set up a savings account, and then the two discuss Tom's plans for the money, which include purchasing supplies to build up Tom's farm and setting up a savings account for Birdy.
• Tom puts new shingles and siding on the barn, making it look different than it had on the Breen property. It's his own now.
• Tom and Birdy burn down what's left of the Breen house, as Tom promised to do when he bought the barn from Mr. Armond.
• Tom and Polly Ann drive up to Mr. Armond's in their new wagon with their new team of horses to pay the remainder of what Tom owes for the barn.