Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: MONDAY, February 14, 1994 TAG: 9402150013
SECTION: NEWSFUN PAGE: 1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: WENDI GIBSON RICHERT STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
- Bryan Smith, Rocky Mount Elementary School
Many people look up to Bryan's heroes. They were brave, strong and dedicated to finding freedom for their race. They took care of their people and didn't give up their fight.
Those are certainly good qualities for a hero.
But the heroes NewsFun readers described have many other qualities, too. They wake us up, tuck us in bed, feed us and buy us clothes.
They help us with our homework and teach us to play ball. Sometimes they say no when we say yes, and sometimes we don't appreciate them very much. But they're still our heroes. They are our parents.
``My hero is my parents,'' wrote Rebecca Lewis of Blacksburg. ``They help me on my homework and painting shirts and doing things that I thought I'd never be able to do in my whole life, and they play with me when I can't or don't want to play with my friends.''
Also doubling as heroes are brothers and sisters - the ones who sometimes make us so mad we could scream, but whose company we love and depend on every day.
Of the responses NewsFun got for the MiniForum question ``Who is your hero?'', one-fourth said parents and siblings ranked numero uno in their lives. This group named family members as heroes for many reasons. But the biggest reason was, as Emma Lugan of New Castle wrote, ``They love me and they care for me.''
Compare this with a survey done by Good Housekeeping magazine in 1990. Almost 200 first- and third-graders from across the country were polled to see who their heroes were. For the first-graders, pop singers Michael Jackson and Janet Jackson ranked tops, followed by moms and dads. For the third-graders, then-President George Bush and singer Paula Abdul ranked first, with no mention of moms and dads in the top five.
Obviously, we choose different heroes almost every year. We may change our minds because of something a hero does or because we find somebody else to look up to.
(Other heroes of the year included then-basketball players Magic Johnson and Michael Jordan, pop group the New Kids on the Block, author Beverly Cleary, astronauts Sally Ride and John Glenn, and then-first lady Barbara Bush.)
Not that famous folks didn't fare well in the MiniForum survey. A significant number - more than 25 percent - of NewsFun readers ranked their heroes as sports standouts, historical figures and superstars. Those of you did positively love basketball slam-dunker Shaquille O'Neill, football players Emmitt Smith and Troy Aikman, figure skater Nancy Kerrigan, singers Mariah Carey and Garth Brooks, and author Beverly Cleary.
You wrote that you want to be like them, you want to meet them and you look up to them.
But, are they really heroes?
Webster's children's dictionary says a hero is ``a person who is looked up to for having done something brave or noble'' - something like saving a family from a burning house, volunteering at homeless shelters[ ]or teaching adults how to read.
Heroes also are determined. That means they do not give up working toward their goals.
Many writers said skater Nancy Kerrigan was their hero because she kept on skating after getting clubbed on the knee. She had a goal of going to the Olympics and she's going. Helen Keller is also a hero. She was blind and deaf, and still she learned to read and communicate with the world around her. Neither of these heroes gave up.
And, heroes do something good for the people around them - whether for their families or all of society. Some of you mentioned famous people who are heroes - such as Abraham Lincoln who freed the slaves, Martin Luther King Jr. who fought for civil rights for blacks and Michael Jordan who had a gambling habit and is now playing baseball.
Some of you wrote to say your teachers and coaches are you heroes because they teach you things that are important. Others said their best friends were heroes and several said their heroes were animals - including Benji and a dog who attacked a robber. Some writers mentioned fictional characters such as Super Man, Cat Woman and the Ninja Turtles; a few didn't have heroes at all.
In fact, Amanda Bowman of Rocky Mount wrote, ``It is not true that everyone has a hero. I do not. I like everyone just the same.''
till, we can all [ be ]heroes, even if we're not fire fighters or police officers. All it takes is courage, determination and a willingness to do something good for the people around us.
by CNB