Heroes for My Son (4 page)

Magician. Escapologist. Stunt artist.

 

 

T
hough he knew it was honest work, the Weiss boy wanted out of the factory.

 

He tried to run away and join the circus, but after his father died, it fell on Ehrich to take care of his family.

 

Ten hours of cutting neckties…or ten hours sweeping in a carnival?

 

In the boardinghouse, they told him to take the work that's dependable.

 

Take the work that feeds your family.

 

Ehrich, however, had a vision.

 

He knew he walked a different path.

 

Flanked by bearded ladies and snake charmers, “the Great Houdini” stepped into the sideshow.

 

For almost a decade, he struggled to feed himself, his mother, his sister.

 

And then what began in a tent made its way to a theater.

 

Harry Houdini became the highest-paid vaudeville performer of his time, forever doing what he loved rather than what was safe.
*

Professional baseball player. Hall of Famer.

 

 

P
itchers threw fastballs at his head.

 

Runners slid at him with their cleats.

 

Catchers spit on his shoes.

 

But it was from the stands that the hate letters and death threats came.

 

As a college student, Jackie had a reputation for fighting.

 

But not in the big leagues. There he practiced self-control.

 

Even when they warned that if he kept playing, they'd kidnap his son.

 

Even when his family waited by the radio, listening for gunshots.

 

Jackie kept silent, speaking loud with no words at all.
*

The greatest scientist of his time.

 

 

H
e didn't speak until he was three years old.

He was the worst-behaved kid in class.

When he was sick and bedridden in grade school, his father showed him a simple compass.

The compass fascinated the boy.

The needle's constant northern swing, guided by what seemed like an invisible force, convinced Einstein that there was “something behind things, something deeply hidden.”

 

No one agreed.

 

One teacher called him a foolish dreamer and asked him to drop out.

But Einstein never stopped dreaming.

As an adult, he scribbled down his ideas and hid them in a desk drawer when his supervisors passed.

He went against conventional wisdom.

He questioned the status quo.

 

His idea? Everything is full of energy.

His conclusion? E = mc
²
.

The theory of relativity didn't just change the world.

It showed us the universe.
*

Gold medal winner. American hero.

 

 

T
he swastika banners were hung everywhere.

Millions of Reichmarks were spent to fund the training of the blond, blue-eyed German athletes.

And in 1936 Berlin, from his lavish balcony, Adolf Hitler saluted his athletes with an outstretched arm, promising that, through sports, the world would finally see “Aryan superiority.”

This was Hitler's Olympics.

 

Jesse Owens was the grandson of a slave, the son of a sharecropper. He suffered from bouts of pneumonia.

He bloomed as a runner. Colleges fought over him—but that didn't mean they thought he was equal.

At Ohio State, he was not offered a scholarship, even though he broke high school world records.

And unlike the Aryan supermen, Jesse Owens worked part-time just to eat.

Working as a gas station attendant, as a waiter, as a night elevator operator, at the campus library stacks—no one paid his way. Ever.

 

The German journalists and announcers wouldn't even use his name.

They said that “the Negro Owens” was a “nonhuman.”

They thought the Aryan win was guaranteed.

 

Jesse Owens competed in four events at the 1936 Olympics.

He won the gold medal in all four.

And when he stood on the victory platform, surrounded by swastikas and soldiers, the German crowd of 110,000 couldn't help but cheer.

Rising to their feet, they were no longer chanting Hitler's name.

They were cheering for Jesse Owens.
*

Upon returning to America, a ticker-tape parade was held in Jesse Owens's honor, but he was forced to ride the freight elevator to the reception at the Waldorf Astoria.

Creator of Kermit the Frog and the Muppets.

 

 

H
e didn't set out to be a puppeteer. He just wanted to work in TV.

 

But at seventeen years old, when he went looking for a job at a local TV station, they rejected him.

 

While there, he saw a sign on a nearby bulletin board. The TV station was looking for a puppeteer.

 

Jim Henson went to the library, checked out a book on puppetry, built a few puppets, and returned to the station.

 

“Now I am a puppeteer. Will you hire me?”

 

They gave him five minutes.

 

It was all Jim Henson needed.
*

But green's the color of spring

And green can be cool and friendly-like

And green can be big like an ocean

Or important like a mountain

Or tall like a tree.

—Kermit the Frog