The Dangerous Book of Heroes (55 page)

Nevertheless, King drove himself to exhaustion. Over eleven years, he wrote five books and countless articles, spoke at more than twenty-five hundred public gatherings, and traveled some six million miles. As well as President Eisenhower and Vice President Nixon, he met heads of state in countries as far away as Ghana and India. He was a visible figurehead of the civil rights movement and also the prime target for those who wanted no change at all.

In 1960, King became involved in nonviolent “sit-in” protests, which involved thousands of black students going to restaurants and department stores where black people were usually refused service. Inspired by King's writing on nonviolent protest, they then sat in silence and refused to respond even if struck. Those protests were extremely successful and ended segregation in restaurants, libraries, and other institutions in more than twenty southern cities. King himself took part in a sit-in and was arrested with fifty-one others and jailed.

The judge who heard his case had met King before. He had in fact
given King a one-year suspended sentence for driving in Georgia with Alabama plates. That period of probation was still running, and although the charges for the sit-in were dropped, the delighted judge sentenced King to four months of hard labor.

When the news became public, presidential candidate John F. Kennedy called Coretta King and offered to help. His brother Senator Robert Kennedy then called both the governor and the judge and secured King's release on bail. King was more than a little relieved to be out of Georgia State Prison. Both he and his father publicly supported the Kennedy bid for the presidency, and on November 8, 1960, Kennedy won by a margin of only 112,000 votes—out of 69 million votes cast.

Between 1960 and 1963, King was highly active in the civil rights struggle. At one point he was trapped inside a church by a white mob and had to be rescued by the National Guard, while his supporters were beaten up, jailed, and even shot as they tried to carry out nonviolent protests. Again and again, white and black moderates told him that he was going too fast, that they should wait a little longer, but he was impatient for real change.

In 1963 he was arrested and jailed again in Birmingham, Alabama, for taking part in a demonstration against segregation in department stores. At that time, Birmingham was a hotbed of Ku Klux Klan activity and there were many incidents of brutality against black residents, including firebombing their homes. Once again, King put himself in danger. In prison, he wrote his famous “Letter from a Birmingham Jail.” It is almost a manifesto for nonviolent protest and a warning to those who chose to ignore the winds of change beginning to sweep the country. More than a million copies were distributed, particularly in the North.

Rather than make King a martyr, on that occasion the judge changed the charge to one of criminal contempt, which meant King left court a free man. He immediately jumped back to the fray. His supporters recruited thousands of black schoolchildren to join the protests, and the media watched in horror as police dogs and fire hoses were turned on the crowds. Not long afterward, President Kennedy
made a promise that the issue of race would have no place in American life or law and prepared a new civil rights bill to be submitted to Congress. In January 1963, King was
Time
magazine's Man of the Year, the first black man to be so honored.

At last, King saw the approach of the sort of federal law he had always wanted. He had long said that it might not have been possible to legislate for integration but that it certainly
was
possible to legislate against segregation. Nonetheless, he would not sit back and wait for it to happen. In August 1963 he organized a march on Washington, D.C., of 250,000 men, women, and children, all in support of the new bill. It was on that hot night, by the Lincoln Memorial, that Martin Luther King gave his most famous speech.

“I have a dream that one day on the red hills of Georgia, sons of former slaves and sons of former slaveholders will be able to sit down together at the table of brotherhood.” He spoke with all the power of a southern preacher, building to a stirring climax of words and ideas that moved many of those who heard him to tears as he finished, “And when this happens…black men and white men, Jews and Gentiles, Protestants and Catholics, will be able to join hands and sing in the words of the old Negro spiritual: ‘Free at last. Free at last. Thank God Almighty, we are free at last.'”

 

In November 1963, President Kennedy was assassinated and the country mourned.

Though it did not go far enough for King, Kennedy's civil rights bill was passed in 1964 under President Johnson. That same year, King received the Nobel Peace Prize and donated the prize money to the civil rights movement.

Copyright © 2009 by Matt Haley

His work continued, and King broadened his cause to fight against poverty and oppose the Vietnam War. Overall King was arrested around twenty times
and assaulted on at least four occasions. It did not stop him. Then, in April 1968, he went to Tennessee to lead a protest march for equal pay for black sanitation workers. There had been always been threats against his life from white extremists—even his plane to Memphis was delayed because of a bomb threat. It was simply part of the landscape in which he had chosen to work.

King was standing on his hotel balcony with friends that night. James Earl Ray, a white man with a string of petty convictions, approached him and shot him once in the head. The killer escaped for a time and was eventually apprehended at Heathrow Airport in London. He would later be sentenced to ninety-nine years in prison, increased to one hundred after an escape attempt.

Martin Luther King didn't live to see the greater part of his work come to fruition. He would never have dared hope that within the lifetime of his supporters, a black man could become president of the United States. Coretta King had died in 2006, but the Reverend Jesse Jackson, who had been with King at that hotel in 1968, wept as the results of the 2008 presidential election were announced.

Recommended

Stride Toward Freedom
by Martin Luther King Jr.

A Call to Conscience: The Landmark Speeches of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.,
edited by Claybourne Carson

Martin Luther King Jr
. by Vincent P. Franklin

W
hen someone rows across the Atlantic, conquers Everest, or runs seven marathons in seven days, he is admired across the world. Our lives are gladdened by the achievement, and we feel that person has done something great. Such people are heroes because they inspire the rest of us, even if it's just for a moment.

Yet there is a second definition of
hero:
one who accomplishes something noble, risking it all in the process. Horatio Nelson may be the best example, as he lost his life defending against a tyranny that would have overrun the world. Most people can see the difference between Nelson and a baseball team winning the World Series.

At no point do those definitions suggest that a hero must be likable. The heroism is in the life, in the achievement across just a short span of years, not in the men or women themselves, and whether they were a good friend, father, or mother. Good men sometimes do bad things, and it is even possible that many great achievements come about because an individual is attempting to atone for some sin, real or imagined, in the past.

When the word is overused, it does reduce its impact, but that is not necessarily a bad thing. We cannot all stand against tyranny, though perhaps more of us should when we encounter its cold hands on a daily basis. Yet if a man is described as a hero for saving a child on a frozen lake, most of us can see that we could be that man. It is heroism within the bounds of possibility.

Being aware that courage is still admired is not a danger to society—far from it. A “have-a-go hero” is a popular phrase for one who risks life and limb to stop a mugging or burglary, or even to have a word with a few kids causing trouble. It is an obvious truth to say there may be risk involved in such an action, but if every good man or woman
turned away with eyes downcast, well, that would scorn the memories of Edith Cavell, Robert Scott, and Helen Keller, who would have waded in, eyesight or not.

However we abuse the word, heroism will never be common or easy. The peculiar truth about humanity is that we deal with fear on a daily basis and that it often conquers us. That does not matter as long as we recognize that there are times when we must not “step off the curb” to let someone pass or something terrible happen.

It is true that only a coward can be brave, as a man who feels no fear has conquered nothing. It is also true that when one person speaks up to stop some wrong, others often join in, desperately relieved that, at last, someone said something. It is not easy to be the one to speak up or to step in. If it was, we would not value and admire those who do. One final truth remains beyond the petty irritations of life in which we lose ourselves: all that is necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing.

 

The men and women in this book were sometimes possessed of incredible self-confidence and personal belief. Others doubted their every action to the point where they could hardly act at all. For some, their heroism is contained in a single moment, while others seem to have lived a life that stands out like a thread of gold. It may not be possible to live like Nelson, but we can be inspired by his life and others like it. We can know that in our history is the blood of greatness, and in our culture, for all its flaws and dark misdeeds, there can also be light.

Note: Entries in this index, carried over verbatim from the print edition of this title, are unlikely to correspond to the pagination of any given e-book reader. However, entries in this index, and other terms, may be easily located by using the search feature of your e-book reader.

 

Note:
Bold page locators
indicate chapter entries.

 

Adams, John, 21, 327, 332, 339, 340

Adventure,
111–14, 116, 117

Afghanistan, 36, 252, 268–69

Agamemnon,
276–77, 279

Alamo, siege of,
193–207

Albemarle,
275, 417

Alcock, John “Jackie,”
368–82

Aldrin, Edwin “Buzz,” 344, 346–48 Alfred (the Great), 170

Allenby, Edmund, 229–32

American Airlines: Flight 11, 247–48; Flight 77, 248–50

American War of Independence, 142, 172, 274; and Boone, 49–52; and Washington, 12–20, 22

Amundsen, Roald, 418–22, 425, 428

Antarctica: and Cook, 105, 112–16; and Scott, 411–33

Apollo 11,
346–48

Armstrong, Neil, 344, 346–48

Atkinson, Edward Leicester, 429–32

aviation, 57–73, 246–52, 306–14, 366–82

 

Bader, Douglas, 72, 441

Ball, Albert, 308, 310, 311

Banks, Joseph, 325, 333, 339, 340

Barne, Michael, 414, 417, 418

Baseden, Yvonne,
187

battle of Britain,
57–73,
262–63

Beaverbrook, Lord (Max Aitken), 61–62, 64, 73

Beck, Martin, 402, 404–5

Behn, Aphra, 138

Bell, Alexander Graham, 94–95, 98–99

Bell, Gertrude, 226, 232

Bernacchi, Louis, 412, 413

Bishop, Billy,
306–14

Blake, William, 175–76

Bletchley Park,
315–24

Bligh, William, 117–20, 284,
325–41

Bloch, Denise,
186

Boer War, 257–60

Bonaparte.
See
Napoléon Bonaparte

Boone, Daniel,
44–56

Bounty,
123,
325–41

Bourdillon, Tom, 127, 128

Bowers, Henry “Birdie,” 423–33

Bowie, Jim, 196–200, 203–4, 206

Braddock, Edward, 6–8, 46

Bradley, John, 300, 303–5

Bradley, Joseph, 216–17

Bridgman, Laura, 94, 95, 97

Brown, Arthur “Teddy,”
368–82

Brueys, François, 280–82

Bryan, Daniel, 55

Burgoyne, John, 15

Burnett, Thomas, 248, 249

Burton, Edward, 34–36

Burton, Isabel Arundell, 41, 42–43

Burton, Richard Francis,
34–43,
234

Buxton, Thomas, 145, 146

Byron, George Gordon, 42–43, 55

 

Cavell, Edith,
165–69
, 446

Chamberlain, Neville, 261–62

Charles I, 84–85, 87–89

Charles II, 89–92, 209–10, 223

Cherry-Garrard, Apsley, 421, 429–30, 432, 433

Christian, Fletcher, 325–29, 332–33, 335–41

Churchill, Winston, 82, 182, 232,
253–65,
315–16, 438; and battle of Britain, 61, 67–68, 70, 72, 73

Clarkson, Thomas, 140–47, 360

Clerke, Charles, 117, 123

Clinton, Henry, 16, 18

Cody, William “Buffalo Bill,” 160–61

Colditz prisoners,
434–42

Collingwood, Cuthbert, 277–78, 287–88, 290, 292

Collins, Michael (astronaut), 344, 346

Collins, Michael (Irish leader), 261

computers, first,
315–24

Constitution, U.S., 20–21, 81

Cook, James, 19,
103–24,
274, 329, 330, 423

Cooper, James Fenimore, 50, 55

Cornwallis, Charles, 15, 16, 18

Crockett, Davy, 47, 197, 199–206

Cromwell, Oliver,
83–92,
208–9

Crook, George, 154–56

Culloden,
277, 278, 281

Custer, George, 153–54, 157–60

 

Dahl, Jason, 246, 248

Dalrymple, Alexander, 106, 111, 114

De Valera, Eamon, 261, 262

Dickens, Charles, 94

Dickinson, Susanna, 199, 200, 203–6

Dinwiddie, Robert, 3–4

Discovery,
117–19, 121, 123, 411–13, 416–17, 424

Dowding, Hugh, 60–69, 72, 73

Drake, Francis, 117, 381,
383–96

 

Eleanor of Aquitaine, 75

Elizabeth I, 383, 385–90, 392–94

Elizabeth II, 82, 130, 264

Endeavour,
106–11, 116

Enigma, 315–19

Evans, Charles, 127, 128

Evans, Edgar “Taff,” 416, 419, 424–27, 429, 433

Everest, George, 125–26

 

Faisal of Saudi Arabia, 226–28, 230–32

Fasson, Francis Anthony Blair, 318–19

Fiennes, Ranulph,
26–33

Filson, John, 52

Findley, John, 48

Flight 93,
246–52

Flint, Timothy, 55

Flowers, Tommy, 321–22

Forbes, John, 8–9

Ford, Henry, 61

Fox, Charles, 142–44

Fram,
418–19, 428

Franklin, Benjamin, 6–7, 13, 15–16, 19, 45, 172

Fraser, George MacDonald, 34

French and Indian War, 4–11, 14, 46

Fryer, John, 326–28, 331–32, 334–35

Furneaux, Tobias, 111, 112–13

 

Gagarin, Yury, 343–45

Gagnon, Rene, 300, 303–5

Gallipoli, 58, 268

Gandhi, Mahatma, 455, 458

Genet, Edmond, 22–23

George III, 47, 116, 159, 275, 325

George V, 444, 448

George, David Lloyd, 260, 261

Gerof, Demetri, 421, 429–30, 432

Gilbert, Humphrey, 384, 389

Glenn, John, 344

Golden Hind,
387–88

Gore, John, 117, 123

Göring, Hermann, 59, 60, 62, 65, 66–69, 71–72

Gran, Tryggve, 419–21, 431, 433

Grieve, Kenneth “Mac,” 367–72

Gronlund, Linda, 249–50

Gurkhas, the,
266–72

 

Haig, Douglas, 443, 447

Hall, Virginia,
189–90

Hallett, John, 332, 337–38

Hallowes, Odette,
187–89

Hamilton, Alexander, 22

Hardy, Thomas, 286, 289–91

Hawker, Harry, 367–72

Hawkins, John, 386–87, 389

Hayes, Ira, 300, 303–5

Hayward, Thomas, 326–27, 332, 337–38

Henderson, Richard, 49

Herbert, Sidney, 238, 240, 241, 244–45

Heywood, Peter, 326–29, 332, 335–41

Hill, Biggin, 65, 66, 68

Hillary, Edmund, 27,
125–31

Houdini, Harry,
397–410

Houston, Sam, 195, 196–98, 200, 205–6

Howe, William, 14–16

Huggan, Thomas, 325, 327

Hunt, John, 126, 129

 

Inskip, Thomas, 60–61

Iwo Jima, battle of,
294–305

 

James I, 83, 84, 394

Jay, John, 23–24

Jefferson, Thomas, 21, 22

Jervis, John, 277–79

John, King, and the Magna Carta,
74–82

Johns, W. E., 232–33

Jones, Gareth, 28–29

 

Keaton, Buster, 400, 407

Keller, Helen,
93–102

Kennedy, John F., 82, 343–45, 460–61

Khan, Noor-un-nisa Inayat,
180–83

King, Martin Luther, Jr.,
453–62

Kitchener, Herbert, 256, 257

Knox, Dillwyn, 319

Knox, Henry, 22

Kuribayashi, Tadamichi, 296, 301–4

 

Langton, Stephen, 77

Lashly, Bill, 416, 424

Lawrence, T. E. (Lawrence of Arabia),
225–34

Lebogue, Lawrence, 328, 332, 334, 338

Ledward, Thomas, 325, 332, 334, 336

Leigh-Mallory, Trafford, 62–64, 69–71

Lister, Joseph, 235

Little Bighorn, battle of, 157–59

Livingstone, David, 133, 147

Locke, John, 20, 138, 171

L'Orient,
281–82, 292

Lowe, George, 127–28, 130

Lynch, Thomas, 220–23

 

McCoy, William, 327–28, 332, 339

Macy, Anne Sullivan, 95–102

Magna Carta,
74–82,
178

Mallory, George, 125, 126, 129

Marks, Leo, 184, 187

Matra, James, 19

Meares, Cecil, 421, 422, 429–30

Mecca, 41, 226–27

Modyford, Thomas, 210–12, 215, 220–22

Morgan, C. W. Fairfax “Fax,” 368, 372

Morgan, Edward, 210–12

Morgan, Henry,
208–24

Morrison, James, 327–29, 332, 336–40

Mount Everest, 27, 32, 125–31

Mount Vernon, 3, 6, 9–11, 20, 22, 24–25

 

Nansen, Fridtjof, 412, 413, 418–20, 428

Napier, Charles, 38–39, 235

Napoléon Bonaparte, 54, 177; and Nelson, 276, 280–83, 285, 286; and Wellington, 354–55, 359–65

NASA, 342–48

Nearne, Eileen,
187

Neill, James C., 196–98

Nelson, David, 326, 330, 332–36

Nelson, Horatio,
273–93,
354

Newman, Max, 320–23

Nightingale, Florence, 166,
235–45

Nimitz, Chester, 295, 304

9/11 terrorist attacks,
246–52

Nixon, Richard, 348, 459

North Pole, 32, 411, 412–14, 418, 420–22

 

Oates, Lawrence “Titus,” 424, 427–33

 

Paine, Thomas, 12, 14, 137,
170–79

Park, Keith, 60, 62–64, 67, 69–73

Parker, Hyde, 283–84

Parks, Rosa, 456–57

Peckover, William, 326, 330, 332, 338

Peña, José de la, 202–5

Pitt, William, 141–43, 146

Pontiac, Chief, 10, 46–47

Pope, Alexander, 138

Priestley, Joseph, 137, 176

Purcell, William, 326, 328, 330–32, 334, 336

 

Railton, David, 443–44, 447, 449

Ralegh, Walter,
383–96

Randolph, Edmund, 22

Raynham, Freddie, 368, 370–73

Reid, Pat, 436, 437, 439, 441–42

Reno, Marcus Albert, 157–58

Resolution,
111–21, 123

Richard I (“the Lion-Hearted”), 74–75

Rights of Man
(Paine), 174–78

Rolfe, Lilian,
185–86

Roosevelt, Theodore, 55

Rosenthal, Joe, 299–300

Ross, James Clark, 411, 412

Royal Air Force (RAF), 181, 191, 232–33, 266–67, 319, 381; and battle of Britain,
57–73

Royal Sovereign,
287–90

 

Santa Anna, Antonio López de, 193–203, 205–6

Santissima Trinidad,
277, 287–89

Schmidt, Harry, 297, 300, 302–3

Scott, Jack, 307, 309

Scott, Robert Falcon, 31, 165,
411–33

Shackleton, Ernest, 413–18, 420–24, 426

Sharp, Granville, 138–40, 142, 144, 145, 147

Shepard, Alan, 344

Sitting Bull (Tatanka Iyotake),
149–64

slavery (slave trade), 3, 10, 11, 16, 19, 21, 132–34, 172, 177, 194, 360, 453; abolition of, in the British Empire,
132–48

Slim, William, 266, 269–70, 295

Sloane, Hans, 136, 137

Smith, Adam, 139, 140, 145

Soult, Jean-de-Dieu, 356, 358

South Pole, 31, 411, 413–16, 418–20, 425–26, 428–29

Special Operations Executive (SOE), women of,
180–92

Speke, John, 42

Spenser, Edmund, 389, 392

Sputnik,
342, 343

Stewart, George, 329, 332, 335, 337

Storrs, Ronald, 227, 232, 234

Suckling, Maurice, 273, 274

Szabó, Violette,
183–85

 

Tennyson, Alfred, 242, 433

Tenzing Norgay,
125–31

Thomson, Polly, 100, 101

Tiltman, John, 316, 320

Tipu Sultan, 181, 351–52

Travis, William, 197–202, 204, 205

Turing, Alan, 317, 320–21, 323–24

Twain, Mark, 101, 253

 

United Airlines Flight 93,
246–52

Unknown Warrior,
443–52

 

Van Braam, Jacob, 3, 5, 6

Vickers, Ltd., 368–82

Victoria, Queen, 34, 42, 241–44

Victory,
273, 276–78, 285–93

Villeneuve, Pierre-Charles, 286–87, 289

 

Wake, Nancy,
190–91

Walpole, Horace, 5

Wardle, Hank, 439, 441, 442

Washington, George,
1–25,
46

Waterloo, battle of, 361–64

Wellesley, Arthur, Duke of Wellington,
349–65

Wesley, John, 138, 142

Wilberforce, William, 140–48

Wilson, Edward, 414–16, 421, 424–28, 430–33

Wolfe, James, 8, 105

World Trade Center attacks, 246–50

World War I, 260–61, 407, 435; and Bishop, 306–14; and Cavell, 166–68; and Lawrence of Arabia, 226–32; Unknown Warrior, 443–52

World War II: battle of Britain, 57–73; and Bletchley Park, 315–24; and Churchill, 253, 262–63; Colditz prisoners, 434–42; and the Gurkhas, 268, 269–70; Iwo Jima, 294–305; SOE, 180–92

Wounded Knee, battle of, 162–63