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Terry Fox

by Brendan from Peterborough


For my "My Hero Project" I have chosen to do Terry Fox. On April 12, 1981 Terry Fox dipped his artificial leg into the Atlantic ocean in St. Johns. It was the beginning of an incredible journey that would go down in Canadian history. Much earlier Terry had been into a car accident in which his car had smashed in a 4000 pound truck. His only injury was a sore knee which when diagnosed turned out to be osteogenic sarcoma which is a form of bone cancer. The leg which was sore had to be amputated 6 inches above the knee and he was given an artificial one. When Terry was in the hospital to get his leg amputated he met other patients who had cancer. He was so saddened that he got an idea. This idea would be no easy feat. It would take over a year of hard training but 18 months later he was ready. His goal? To run the entire length of Canada. He had run over five thousand kilometers to prepare and finally he was ready. He dipped his artificial leg in the Atlantic ocean in St. Johns and at the end of the run he was to dip his leg in the Pacific ocean in Victoria, British Columbia. His goal was to raise the equivalent amount of one dollar for every Canadian and the money would go towards cancer research.


He ran through Newfoundland, Quebec and Ontario at an excruciating rate of 42 kilometers a day. Just to show how much that is I once took a 21 kilometer hike which took me all day and that was very very tiring. Terry Fox ran twice that every day with one leg. Terry fox had been running for 143 days and had covered 5 373 kilometers when tragedy struck. The cancer from his amputated leg had returned and spread to his lungs. He was forced to abandon his run and 8 months later he died of pneumonia. His funeral was shown live all over the country.


Even though Terry Fox is now dead, money is still being raised for cancer research because of him, in ways like having Terry Fox Runs all over the world where people run non-competitively and money is raised for cancer research. Today more than $300 000 000 have been raised for cancer research because of him. He was voted Canada’s 2nd greatest Canadian and other people has been inspired by him including someone else who completed his full course (they had also lost their leg to cancer).

Terry Fox is my hero because of his huge determination and unselfishness. He ran a huge distance and made a huge contribution to cancer research. He showed an incredible amount of endurance and didn’t give up until he absolutely had to.

All information and pictures gathered from:
http://www.civilization.ca/
http://www.nyc.gov
http://www.farnorthblog.blogspot.com/
http://www.terryfoxrun.org
http://www.wikipedia.org/

Page created on 1/8/2008 12:00:00 AM

Last edited 1/8/2008 12:00:00 AM

The beliefs, viewpoints and opinions expressed in this hero submission on the website are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the beliefs, viewpoints and opinions of The MY HERO Project and its staff.