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- The Chernobyl Three. On the morning of April 26, 1986, scientists got to work on a new series of tests in Unit 4 of the Chernobyl nuclear power plant in northern Ukraine.
- John Robert Fox. During the Second World War, countless Allied soldiers put their lives on the line for the good of their country. Others simply offered themselves up in order to save comrades.
- Alfred Vanderbilt. When disaster strikes, men and women are capable of moments of pure heroism. Sadly, all too often, such acts are largely forgotten to history.
- Alexander Stchukin and the scientists of Stalingrad. Nobody can say for certain how many people died from starvation during the 900-day Siege of Leningrad.
- 10 Officer Damon Cole
- 9 Tony Fowler
- 8 Tejinder Singh
- 7 Bea Gaddy
- 6 Dr. Jim Withers
- 5 Dr. Ganesh Rakh
- 4 Saber Hosseini
- 3 Andeisha Farid
- 2 Yuval Roth
- 1 Anwar Khokhar
Officer Damon Cole is a real-life supercop but not for the reasons one might expect. When he isn’t off busting bad guys, Cole is traveling hundreds of miles to greet seriously ill children while dressed as their favorite superheroes. He has driven to 11 states, posing as Superman, Batman, and the Incredible Hulk among others. Cole’s caped crusade, ...
Tony Fowler has braved flood watersto rescue a cat in peril. He has hijacked the getaway car of thieves to prevent their escape and participated in a drug bust. He’s also saved an Alzheimer’s patient from a burning house. Fowler’s laundry list of good deeds sounds like the resume of a budding superhero. But in reality, he’s just an incredibly helpf...
During the day, Tejinder Singh repairs air conditioners. At night, he works as a cabdriver. And one Sunday a month, going on no sleep, he spends hours feeding the hungry and homelessof Darwin, Australia. The cabdriver’s charitable exploits were inspired by prejudice. Singh, a Sikh who hails from India’s Punjab region, was ferrying a man through Dar...
For years, Bea Gaddy vacillated between low-paying jobs and homelessness, digging through trash cans for nuggets of sustenance when she couldn’t afford food. Then one day in 1981, her luck changed. She purchased a 50-cent lottery ticket and won $290. What Gaddy did next would define the rest of her life. Gaddy used her lottery winnings to feed 39 h...
Not many doctors can say they’ve had a prospective patient pull a shotgun on them, but Jim Withers can. A practitioner of street medicine, Dr. Withers treats people from the lowest echelons of society. Inspired by his mother, who served the needy through Meals on Wheels, and his father, a doctor who made house calls, Dr. Withers began tending to th...
In his youth, Ganesh Rakh wanted to be a wrestler. Instead, he became a doctor who combats prejudice. In India, a country racked with rampant gender discrimination, female infanticide is startlingly common. Dr. Rakh has set out to change that. In 2012, Dr. Rakh began the Mulgi Vachva Abhiyan (“campaign to save the girl child“). At his hospital, gir...
Afghan schoolteacher Saber Hosseini receives death threats from the Taliban for helping disadvantaged families. It started in 2015 when the schoolteacher was looking for a way to increase literacy among childrenin the distant and difficult-to-access parts of Afghanistan. Friends in literary circles helped him amass 200 books. Transporting hundreds ...
Andeisha Farid grew up as “one of the luckiest children among all the thousands of children living in a terrible situation.” An Afghan refugee from the day she was born, she spent the earliest years of her life in Iranian refugee camps after a Soviet air strike demolished her family home. Subsisting without clean drinking water, medical care, or sc...
Israeli carpenter and professional juggler Yuval Roth knows loss like the backs of his skilled hands. In 1993, his brother Udi was abducted and slain by Hamas. The tragedy left a gaping hole in Roth’s heart that he needed to fill. But rather than wallow in bitterness, he joined a forum dedicated to ending the divide between Israelis and Palestinian...
Anwar Khokhar cuts hair for a living. But despite being known as the Barber of Larkana, Khokhar is acclaimed for something far greater. For two decades, he’s been a shepherd to Pakistan’s missing and kidnapped children. Khokhar had his first brushes with heroism in the late 1980s. Back then, he volunteered at a local shrine where he crossed paths w...
- Protecting People at All Costs. During World War II, German industrialist Oskar Schindler saved the lives of over 1,000 Jews by employing them in his various factories.
- In Service of Future Generations. Following the 2011 nuclear disaster in Fukushima, Japan, a group of over 400 elderly and retired engineers banded together to resolve the crisis.
- The Human Life Preserver. Harold Lowe was an officer of the British Merchant Navy aboard the RMS Titanic during its fateful maiden voyage. Lowe initially led one of the many lifeboats that transported shipwrecked passengers to safety.
- Helping Others in Need of Transplants. Anthony Nolan was born in the UK in 1971 with a rare condition called Wiskott-Aldrich syndrome, which required a bone marrow transplant.
Aug 11, 2022 · From daring feats of wartime valor to fearless rescues amid natural disasters, these nine people throughout history selflessly gave their own lives to save others.
- Joan of Arc. Joan of Arc was one of the most courageous people in history. She was able to defy the odds and lead the French army to victory against the English.
- Mahatma Gandhi. If there’s one thing, we can all agree on, it’s that Mahatma Gandhi was an incredibly courageous person. He led a movement that fought for India’s freedom from British colonialism and inspired a generation of change-makers.
- Nelson Mandela. Nelson Mandela was a courageous person who dedicated his life to the fight against racial discrimination and for justice and equality.
- Martin Luther King Jr. is a prime example of a courageous person. As a young man, he campaigned tirelessly for civil rights and racial equality throughout the 1950s and 1960s, after the second world war, often facing danger and violence in the process.
Dec 21, 2017 · The work carried out by this Roman Catholic nun was so prolific that she is now what most us think of when we hear the word ‘saint’. She dedicated her life to kindness, opening homes and offering support for the sick, the homeless, orphans, those suffering from leprosy and other marginalised groups.
Apr 4, 2013 · Casey Jones. Casey Jones is an American hero who has been immortalized in song—an honor he earned by saving an entire train full of people. While highballing (driving fast to make up for lost time) a train to Mississippi, Casey’s fireman noticed that there was a stalled freighter on the tracks.
