Washington

By Cary-Anne Olsen

A four-line poem written on a birthday card had more influence on World War II Air Force pilot Lieutenant Colonel Henry "Hank" Cervantes than his teacher could have ever imagined.

"On my eighth birthday, Miss Neilmeyer, my third-grade teacher, gave me a card on which she had written,

'Dream your dreams upon a star

Dream them high and dream them far.

For the dreams we dream in youth,

Makes us what we are.'

I thought it had to do with flying-high, stars [and] ‘far,’ and I began thinking about being a pilot at that age."

By Ruchika Joshi

Guy Gabaldon said he stopped counting how many people he was taking prisoner in Saipan during World War II. But in a 1957 episode of the television program, "This Is Your Life," his fellow Marines credited him with single-handedly capturing more than 1,500 Japanese soldiers and civilians.

He was hero at 18. In 1960, a movie was made of his life, called "Hell to Eternity." But the role of Gabaldon was changed from being a short Mexican American from East Los Angeles to the tall, blue-eyed Jeffrey Hunter.