by Ben Brooks
MAHATMA GANDHI
(1869–1948)
In 1858, after a vicious and bloody rebellion, the British army seized control of India. They brought some good things with them, like medicine and railways. But they also shot innocent Indians and caused millions to die from starvation.
Thirty years later, a nineteen-year-old man called Mahatma Gandhi traveled to England to study law. With his degree, he got a job and was sent with his family to work in South Africa.
Gandhi was shocked by the racism in South Africa. One day, he was beaten and thrown off a train for refusing to give up his seat to a white person.
This treatment led Gandhi to come up with a new type of action called satyagraha.
Satyagraha means “truth force,” and using it means never allowing violence and only speaking the truth. According to Gandhi, nonviolence isn’t being afraid to fight, it’s just a different type of fighting. It’s fighting with the heart and mind. It’s fighting by refusing to hide, run, or attack with weapons.
Back in India, Gandhi taught his compatriots about this new tactic and they took it up to fight back against the British. They used protests, stopped buying British things, and ignored British laws that told them what they could and couldn’t do.
In one protest, huge numbers of Indians turned out, quietly opposing the people who were ruling them. When they were arrested, they peacefully went to jails, and more people took their places. Eventually, the jails were so full, everyone had to be released.
Finally, in 1947, India gained its independence and the British sailed home.
BILL GATES
(BORN 1955)
“There is no reason anyone would want a computer in their home,” announced a rich businessman forty years ago.
Bill thought the opposite was true. He thought that, one day, every home in the world would have a computer. It seems obvious now, but it wasn’t back then. At the time, computers were the size of ovens and couldn’t do anything we’d find very exciting. They were so expensive that only big companies could afford to own them.
Bill was lucky, though; his school had made a deal with one of those companies, which meant the children were allowed to use their computer for a few hours every week.
Straight away, Bill was amazed by the possibilities. With his best friend, Paul Allen, Bill skipped classes and hid out in the computer room, hacking in to get more time. When he was only fifteen, he created a program that counted vehicle traffic, and he sold it for $20,000.
Once school was over, Bill’s dad pressured him to go to college to study law. Bill went, but his heart wasn’t really in it. All he could think about was computers. He kept imagining how they could become windows to everything we wanted to know about the world.
So he dropped out of college, called his old friend, Paul, and started a computer company called Microsoft.
Most of the computers in the world now use Microsoft. It’s made Bill one of the richest people alive. To spend the money wisely, he started a charity with his wife, Melinda, and together they help people all over the world get access to clean water, food, disaster relief, education, medicine, and libraries.
SIDDHARTHA GAUTAMA
(CIRCA 480 BC–400 BC)
Gautama was a prince, born in a country called Nepal, in a grand palace surrounded by high walls. His parents, the king and queen, wanted to shelter him from the outside world. The only life they wanted him to know was one of beautiful clothes, rich food, and happy, restful days.
He grew up never learning about pain, suffering, or poverty, and he married a beautiful princess who lived with him in the palace grounds.
But Siddhartha grew more and more curious about the outside world. One day, he had his charioteer take him outside the castle, into the town. There, Siddhartha was shocked by what he saw.
First, he saw an old man and he knew that, with age, people became frail.
Then, he saw a sick man, and he knew that any person could be afflicted with disease.
Finally, he saw a dead man, and he knew that we would all one day die.
Seeing all these things made Siddhartha realize how meaningless his life in the palace really was. He took off his fine clothes and left the palace forever, venturing out into the world with nothing.
On his travels, Siddhartha came to a large tree and he sat beneath it for forty-nine days, meditating. After those forty-nine days, he shared everything he’d learned with five people who traveled far and wide, spreading news of a new religion: Buddhism.
The religion talked about nonviolence, compassion, forgiveness, and tolerance. It said that the world is filled with misery and misery is caused by desire. If we could only stop desiring things, we might stop being miserable.
RICK GENEST
(BORN 1985)
Rick was always fascinated with body art. He’d buy bubblegum just so he could get the fake tattoos that came inside the wrappers.
He was only fifteen when he found out he had a brain tumor. Doctors said there was a chance he might die, which started Rick thinking about death and dark things. He survived the tumor, but his interest in death carried on, and he decided to mix it with his passion for body art.
After getting his first tattoo, a skull and crossbones, Rick became obsessed, and he carried on getting tattoos until the whole of his body was covered.
People started stopping him for photos in the street, amazed by how he looked. Other people said cruel things, but Rick knew you couldn’t be yourself without being picked on by someone.
“I didn’t do this to be different,” he’d explain. “I did this to be me.”
When a traveling circus rolled through his town, Rick joined it and they gave him the name Zombie Boy. He performed alongside Lizard Man, whose tongue was split in two, and Vampire Woman, who had her teeth sharpened to points. It was difficult work, but at least he’d found a place where he fit in.
One day, Rick’s friend asked if he wanted to dress up and pose for some photos. Rick agreed and a world-famous fashion designer ended up seeing the photos when they were used in a magazine. Immediately, he flew Rick to Paris, where a new career began for him.
Now Rick’s an international model. He’s been in Hollywood films, music videos, and had his face put on a doll for kids. Rick isn’t made to feel like a freak anymore. He feels like himself and people love him for it.
KING GEORGE VI
(1895–1952)
George never expected to be king. His older brother, Edward, was supposed to take the throne when their father died. And Edward did, for a little while, until he fell in love with a woman who he wasn’t allowed to marry, so he stepped down, and George was forced to take his place.
Growing up, George was often frightened, often crying, and often sick. He also had a stammer, which made it difficult for him to speak, and because of that he became embarrassed and shy.
The day he found out he was to be king was terrifying. He went to visit his mother, and he wrote in his diary: “When I told her what had happened, I broke down and sobbed uncontrollably.”
One of the things he was most worried about was having to talk in front of people. It was an age when the radio was becoming popular, and the royal family would have to use it to communicate with their people.
To try and prepare him, George was sent to see a speech therapist named Lionel Logue. Lionel believed that the only reason George found it difficult to speak in public was because he was so worried about how he sounded. He thought that, if George couldn’t hear himself, he wouldn’t need to be worried, and he wouldn’t stammer. To test his idea, Lionel put headphones on George, loudly played music into them, and gave him a speech to read. George was frustrated because he didn’t think it was working. He stormed out.
Later, when he listened to a recording, he found that he wasn’t stammering at all.
With Lionel’s help, George gave speeches in public, opened Parliament, and announced to the British people that Britain had decided to go to war with Germany. He
stayed friends with Lionel for the rest of his life and ended up being one of the best-loved kings that England had ever had.
JOHN GREEN
(BORN 1977)
At school, John wore braces, was bullied, and generally got the kind of grades that you try to hide from your parents. What made it worse was how well his brother, Hank, always did.
As he got older, John realized he wanted to write books for young people—books that didn’t speak to them like they were babies. From working at a children’s hospital, he knew that young people know and wonder as much as adults about life and death, and they want to read books about those things, too.
After becoming a writer, John started to miss being around people. Because he hardly saw Hank anymore, he suggested that, for an entire year, the two of them communicate with each other through YouTube videos. His brother agreed.
In the videos, they talked about themselves, their lives, science, pizza, giraffes, and Harry Potter. Millions of young people started watching. Through forums and comment sections, the young people became friends and they gave themselves a name: nerdfighters.
The nerdfighters collected money for charity, raised awareness of causes, and tried their best to look out for each other.
One nerdfighter, a warm and hilarious girl named Esther, was sick with cancer when John became friends with her. After she died, he wrote a book inspired by her life: The Fault in Our Stars. With the help of the nerdfighters, who spread word of it everywhere they could, the book went on to be a huge bestseller and a hit film.
John and his brother are very close now. Once a year, they tell each other, “I love you.” They say it on Esther’s birthday, a day celebrated by nerdfighters across the world.
ALAN L. HART
(1890–1962)
When he was young, Alan was known as Lucille; his parents named him that because they thought he was a girl. But Alan didn’t feel comfortable in his own body. He didn’t feel comfortable because he felt as though he was trapped in a girl’s body.
“Can I cut my hair and be a boy?” he’d ask his mom.
She wouldn’t listen.
When he had to go to school, Alan was forced to wear girls’ clothes. He struggled throughout his years there, and, to cope with his problem, he lost himself in his studies, especially science. That hard work earned him a place at a university, where he met and fell in love with a woman. But when Alan wore the boys’ clothes he preferred, she left him.
Struggling, Alan went to visit a psychiatrist named Dr. Gilbert. After a lot of tests and questions, Dr. Gilbert diagnosed Alan as transgender. It meant that the body he was in didn’t match how he felt inside. According to Dr. Gilbert, Alan had been born a boy in a girl’s body. Dr. Gilbert firmly believed that the opposite could be true, too, where girls were born in the bodies of boys.
Alan just wanted to be accepted for the man he was, and to be allowed to study and practice medicine, so Dr. Gilbert performed an operation on him. Alan became one of the first ever transgender people to have their body changed to match how they felt inside.
As well as studying medicine, Alan channeled all of his experiences into novels that became bestsellers. He fell in love with a woman, married her, and they lived together happily for thirty-seven years. During that time, he conducted groundbreaking work on a disease called tuberculosis, and saved a lot of lives.
Society made life difficult for people like Alan, but that never stopped Alan from doing everything he could for society.
ACHMAT HASSIEM
(BORN 1982)
One quiet Sunday morning in Cape Town, Achmat and his brother, Tariq, were at the beach practicing with friends for their lifeguard exams. In the exam, some people would pretend to be drowning while the others launched a boat to save them. Tariq swam out and floated, while Achmat stayed near the shore, both waiting to be rescued.
That was when Achmat saw a huge, dark shape barrelling toward his brother. He wasn’t sure what it was until a black fin broke the water. The shape was a great white shark.
Trying to distract it, Achmat madly splashed and shouted. His tactic worked. The shark turned and headed for him instead, letting the lifeboat pull Tariq to safety.
But there was no time for the boat to reach Achmat. The shark reared up, its jaw locked open, showing rows and rows of bloody, jagged teeth. Achmat tried to get away. He couldn’t move. Looking down, he realized the shark had his entire leg in its mouth.
At the last moment, his brother’s hand appeared from above, dragging him aboard the boat.
When he woke up in the hospital, Achmat fell into a depression. His leg was gone. He’d always loved sports and swimming, and now he was worried he wouldn’t be able to do either.
Then he got a visit from an athlete named Natalie du Toit. She’d lost her leg when she was seventeen and had become a Paralympic swimmer, winning medals at three different Paralympics. She told him he should try it. He did, and he ended up winning in the Paralympics, too.
As he walked out for the final race, the audience chanted, “Shark boy! Shark boy! Shark boy!”
STEPHEN HAWKING
(1942–2018)
School bored Stephen, so he was thrilled when it finished and he could move to the University of Cambridge to learn about cosmology, the study of everything to do with our universe.
Stephen had a lot of big questions. How did the universe start? And why? What came before it? And what exactly are black holes?
He had a special mind, and his work quickly impressed everyone.
Then, when Stephen was twenty-one, his friends and family started to notice that he would trip over and sometimes lose control of his words. They were worried. They sent him to a doctor, who diagnosed him with a disease called ALS, which meant that Stephen’s body was slowly shutting down. The doctors said that he only had two more years to live. Hearing that, Stephen threw himself straight back into his investigation of the cosmos.
Stephen lived for more than fifty years past that diagnosis and he is one of the most important physicists to have ever lived. Even though he was in a wheelchair and needed a computer to speak, Stephen never stopped searching for a theory of everything: one single idea that could explain the entire universe and everything in it.
He also found time to write a famous book titled A Brief History of Time, which, for a lot of people everywhere, was their first glimpse into the grand mysteries of time and space.
Stephen spent his final years with his children and grandchildren, continuing his research, and traveling to give lectures on the cosmos.
“However difficult life may seem,” he says, “there is always something you can do and succeed at. It matters that you don’t just give up.”
JIM HENSON
(1936–1990)
Jim and his best friend, Kermit, used to spend whole days having adventures and collecting animals out in the woods. He’d bring them home, too. His grandma always had to check her chair before she sat down in case he’d left a turtle or a frog on it.
Out of everyone he knew, Jim was closest to his grandma. She made quilts and did needlework, which she showed to Jim, encouraging him to start work on his own projects.
“What do you want to do most in the world?” she asked him.
Jim thought long and hard. “Puppets,” he told her. “I want to make puppets.”
“Then do it.”
Jim had his own approach to puppetry. Most of the puppets at the time were stiff and made out of wood, but Jim made his out of flexible things, like cloth and rubber, so he could give them more life and expression, like the real creatures he’d seen.
He made his first puppet out of his mom’s old coat, a piece of cardboard, and two ping-pong balls. The puppet was a frog called Kermit, named after his old friend.
Then Jim went everywhere looking for a job, and eventually a local TV station hired him to perform with his puppets. They didn’t care that he was still in school. For them, it just meant they could pay him less.
The show was canceled after two episodes, but Jim impressed everyone so much that he was invited to try again on an even bigger channel.
Along with his friends Miss Piggy, Fozzie Bear, Gonzo, and all the other Muppets, Kermit starred in TV shows and films and became one of the best-loved characters in the world. These films are still shown in hundreds of countries today. Kermit gave this advice to all the children watching The Muppet Show: “Just because you haven’t found your talent yet doesn’t mean you don’t have one.”
RYAN HRELJAC
(BORN 1991)
One day, when Ryan was six years old, his teacher taught a lesson about Africa. She explained that in some parts of Africa it was almost impossible for people to get clean water. Without clean water, people, and especially children, could get sick and die.
Ryan was shocked. All he had to do was walk into his kitchen and turn on the tap if he wanted something to drink.
He knew he had to help.
After some research, Ryan found an organization called WaterCan that could help African families by digging deep wells and then using pumps to pull clean water from underground. But the wells were expensive to build. So Ryan started doing more chores around the house and saving all his allowance. But it still wasn’t enough. He had to think bigger.
He spoke out in public, collected money at school, and did everything he could to fundraise. Eventually, he had enough for a well.
Ryan didn’t stop there. He started his own charity, kept raising money, and traveled across the world meeting celebrities, donors, and the children he’d always wanted to help.
His charity, Ryan’s Well Foundation, is over eighteen years old now. And it’s helped nine hundred thousand people in Africa get clean water.
