Those words were shouted by Rick Rescorla as he herded 2700 people out of tower two 8 years ago today. [This is an annual post. Please sign the petition at the end of the post. Thank you.] “Men of Cornwall stop your dreaming Can’t you see their spear…

God Bless all of them!

Thanks for relating this, BW. I’d never heard this before.

Whatever his profession (or lack) of faith, Rick Rescorla exemplified the best of the Christian tradition. And if I’m correct in my beliefs, he’ll recognize our Lord, and be recognized, when the dead are raised to see Jesus coming in the clouds. I want to meet that man — what a mensch!

There were so many heroes that day. I hope I would rise to such an occasion if I ever faced something similar.

Deana

In my home town sixty years ago when I was a child, my mother and father used to take me and my brothers and sisters out to Swope Park on Sunday afternoons. It was a wonderful place for kids, with picnic grounds and lakes and a zoo. But a railroad line cut straight through it.

One Sunday afternoon a young married couple were crossing these tracks. She apparently did not watch her step, for she managed to catch her foot in the frog of a switch to a siding and could not pull it free. Her husband stopped to help her. But try as they might they could not get her foot loose. While they were working at it, a tramp showed up, walking the ties. He joined the husband in trying to pull the young woman’s foot loose. No luck.

Out of sight around the curve a train whistled. Perhaps there would have been time to run and flag it down, perhaps not. In any case both men went right ahead trying to pull her free… and the train hit them. The wife was killed, the husband was mortally injured and died later, the tramp was killed – and testimony showed that neither man made the slightest effort to save himself. The husband’s behavior was heroic… but what we expect of a husband toward his wife: his right, and his proud privilege, to die for his woman. But what of this nameless stranger? Up to the very last second he could have jumped clear. He did not. He was still trying to save this woman he had never seen before in his life, right up to the very instant the train killed him. And that’s all we’ll ever know about him.

THIS is how a man dies. This is how a MAN . . . lives!

Stouthearted Men

you have dreams if you act
They will come true
Would you turn your dreams to a fact
It’ s up to you
If you have the soul and the spirit
Never fear it you’ll see it through
Hearts can inspire other hearts with their fire
For the strong obey
When a strong man shows them the way
Give me some men
Who are stout-hearted men
Who will fight for the right they adore
Start me with ten
Who are stout-hearted men
And i’ll soon give you ten thousand more
Shoulder to shoulder
And bolder and bolder
They grow as they go to the fore
Then there’s nothing in the world
Can stall or halt plan
When stout-hearted men
Can stick together man to man
When stout-hearted men
Can stick together man to man…