Terry Fox

Terry Fox

Terry Fox was born in Winnipeg, Manitoba July 28 1985. His siblings' names were Fred, Darell and Judith. His parents' names are Betty and Rolly. Terry loved his family. He also loved basketball. He first played basketball when he was in university. His university was called Simon Fraser University. Terry was the shortest person when he was on the team. Terry was very athletic, he would wake up early in the morning just to play basketball. When Terry was 18 he got some pain in his right knee. The pain hurt so much he had to go to the doctor. The doctor told him he had Osteogenic Sarcoma. It was a rare disease only athletic boys can get. The doctor told Terry that he would have to cut Terry's leg off. Terry cried when he heard that. Then after the doctor cut off his leg, he got a prosthetic leg. It was hard for Terry to get used to the new leg, but it never hurt him.

One day Terry went to the hospital for sick kids. He saw some kids had cancer too. Then Terry got inspired by the kids. Then he thought he would do a run, a run for cancer research. So he told his mom he would run all across Canada and give every Canadian 1$. She thought Terry was crazy! But nothing can stop Terry from running.Then Terry asked his best friend Doug to come on the wild adventure. Then the run began.

The Terry Fox run began on April 12 1981 in Newfoundland. Terry would wake up at 4am every day to begin running again. The last place where Terry stopped running he would mark it by placing stones there. Terry would raise about 300$ per day. While Terry would run, people would give him money. Also people would interview Terry while he‘ll take breaks. He would stop for water and food and let’s just say he ate a lot! Also some days when Terry took some breaks, sometimes people called him and sometimes he got medals.

One day Terry met Bobby Orr at a party he went to. Another day he met a 10 year old boy who had cancer too. The 10 year old boy asked Terry if he could swim with him and of course Terry said yes. After they swam together Terry said a beautiful speech about how the little boy went thru the same thing as Terry. Then after running and raising over 10,000000 dollars something happened to Terry. He had a hard trouble trying to breathe. He had to go to the doctor immediately. The cancer had spread to Terry’s lungs. Terry needed treatment as soon as possible. But Terry died. :(

One  character trait Terry has is that he is positive. When something put him down he wouldn’t let that get in his way. Another character trait that Terry had is that he was stubborn. He would keep doing running and never stop!

Terry inspires me because when he did the run, he ran for all the people who had cancer and he had cancer and he made such a big difference now. Ryleigh, Sara, Lauryn, Lejla and I are making bracelets for cancer research. We are hoping to raise 100 dollars.

In 1981 Terry passed away, but Terry’s dream still lives even 33 years later.