Lawrence Herkimer

Lawrence Herkimer at his desk

Lawrence Herkimer has made cheerleading get bigger during his lifetime that has passed because of one mistake. Lawrence Herkimer was a very successful man. Lawrence was a passionate, hopeful, and encouraging man. He was passionate because he made a cheer camp for boys and girls. Hopeful because from the beginning he always felt confident about everyone and everything. He was encouraging because he convinced people to cheer and to join his camp. Those are three main characteristics of Lawrence H. who had made cheerleading exciting.

One of his main characteristics is that he is passionate about himself, his family, and his fellow cheerleaders. He cheered for as long as he could through high school to college. When he got older he made a cheer camp. The camp was made for boys and girls because boys cheered too. The first day he had the camp, he was super confident about it. Lawrence had cheered and loved it, from the beginning and still loves it today. Cheering was fun for him but it's not the same as it use to be. There is one scary thing about cheerleading and it is still very dangerous. Did you know that cheerleading is in second place behind rugby by a half point? But Lawrence was known cheerleader because one day he was jumping into a split and then a new jump was invented that now today is called the “herkie”. Cheerleading can be very dangerous. Lawrence has had many injuries in his time of cheering. One of his worst injuries was when he broke his hand. When he recovered from his injury he went straight back to cheerleading. Nothing was going to stop him. Now you can tell that Lawrence was very passionate about cheerleading.

Another one of his characteristics is that he is hopeful. The beginning of his new cheer camp was very successful. He started his cheer camp in 1948 at Sam Houston State Teachers college with 53 participants. He had feelings that one day he would have to give the camp away. But before that he had great hopes for the camp no matter what happened. The day finally came when he sold the camp. It was 1986 and he sold the camp for $20 million. But he knew that the camp was put in good hands. After he sold the camp he was upset but it was for the best.

His final characteristic is encouragement. At the camp the coaches were tough to the cheerleaders but also caring. The coaches said “if you want to cheer then work for it”, many times. When Lawrence cheered he encouraged his friends to cheer with him. When people just wanted to give up he would help others to stay and cheer. Lawrence to this day is still physically fit and still loves cheering. Anyone can encourage people but Lawrence is very good at it.

Lawrence Herkimer is a passionate, hopeful, and encouraging man. All because of an accident, a new jump was made and now cheerleading is bigger today. Cheerleading is still in Lawrence’s eyes today.