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WITandWISDOM(tm) - February 14, 2007 ISSN 1538-8794 ~~~~~~~ THOUGHTS: Never does the human soul appear so strong and noble as when it forgoes revenge and dares to forgive an injury. - E. H. Chapin Source: Carol's Thought for Today, http://home.comcast.net/~mrs.carol/ ~~~~~~~ SPECIAL THOUGHTS: In 1962, four nervous young musicians played their first record audition for the executives of the Decca Recording company. The executives were not impressed. While turning down this group of musicians, one executive said, "We don't like their sound. Groups of guitars are on the way out." The group was called The Beatles. In 1944, Emmeline Snively, director of the Blue Book Modeling Agency, told modeling hopeful Norma Jean Baker, "You'd better learn secretarial work or else get married." She went on and became Marilyn Monroe. In 1954, Jimmy Denny, manager of the Grand Ole Opry fired a singer after one performance. He told him, "You ain't goin' nowhere son. You ought to go back to drivin' a truck." He went on to become the most popular singer in America, named Elvis Presley. When Alexander Graham Bell invented the telephone in 1876, it did not ring off the hook with calls from potential backers. After making a demonstration call, President Rutherford Hayes said, "That's an amazing invention, but who would ever want to use one of them?" When Thomas Edison invented the light bulb, he tried over 2000 experiments before he got it to work. A young reporter asked him how it felt to fail so many times. He said, "I never failed once. I invented the light bulb. It just happened to be a 2000-step process." In the 1940's, another young inventor named Chester Carlson took his idea to 20 corporations, including some of the biggest in the country. They all turned him down. In 1947 - after seven long years of rejections! He finally got a tiny company in Rochester, New York, the Haloid Company, to purchase the rights to his invention, an electrostatic paper-copying process. Haloid became Xerox Corporation we know today. Wilma Rudolph was the 20th of 22 children. She was born prematurely and her survival was doubtful. When she was 4 years old, she contacted double pneumonia and scarlet fever, which left her with a paralyzed left leg. At age 9, she removed the metal leg brace she had been dependent on and began to walk without it. By 13 she had developed rhythmic walk, which doctors said was a miracle. That same year she decided to become a runner. She entered a race and came in last. For the next few years every race she entered, she came in last. Everyone told her to quit, but she kept on running. One day she actually won a race. And then another. From then on she won every race she entered. Eventually this little girl, who was told she would never walk again, went on to win three Olympic gold medals. The moral of the above Stories: Character cannot be developed in ease and quiet. Only through experiences of trial and suffering can the soul be strengthened, vision cleared, ambition inspired and success achieved. You gain strength, experience and confidence by every experience where you really stop to look fear in the face. You must do the thing you cannot do. And remember, the finest steel gets sent through the hottest furnace. A winner is not one who never fails, but one who NEVER QUITS! In LIFE, remember that you pass this way only once! Let's live life to the fullest and give it our best. Source: Marcella's Inspiring Collection http://tinyurl.com/w9nb9 ~~~~~~~ THIS & THAT: Mariane's Valentines (Rejected by Hallmark Cards) By Mariane Holbrook http://www.marianholbrook.com/ With all my heart I love you, With all my heart I care; I still have one big question, though, "Do you still dye your hair?" ~~~~ You look so lovely in that dress I even love your hat. Is it okay to tell the world You've gotten sorta fat? ~~~~ My valentine, I love you so, You fill my heart with bliss. If you'd just put your teeth in Then I might enjoy a kiss. ~~~~ Dear Valentine, you are so dear, I love your tender touch. Let's just forget your mother said You'd not amount to much. Source: Monday Fodder by Dave Aufrance, Missionary in Hongkong mailto:daveaufrance@gmail.com?Subject=Subscribe_Monday_Fodder http://www.fishermansnet.com/monday-fodder/ ~~~~~~~ KEEP SMILING: One evening while I was preparing dinner, my daughter came into the kitchen asking for homework help on her vocabulary words. "Mom," she asked, "what's a quarter horse?" As I thought of a simple explanation, my five-year-old son piped up, "It's the one they have in front of the grocery store." Source: Laughter for a Saturday mailto:ed548@yahoo.com?subject=Subscribe_to_Laughter_for_a_Saturday ~~~~~~~ TRIVIA: Late Last Year, the CBS' news magazine 60 Minutes gave viewers a never before seen look into the International Tracing Service in Bad Arolsen, Germany. Created by the Red Cross shortly after World War II, the International Tracing Service is the largest Holocaust archive in the world. On its 16 miles of shelves are 50 million documents holding the stories of 17 million victims of the Holocaust, including - The paper trail for "Frank, Annaliese Marie" as she was sent from Amsterdam to her eventual death at Bergen-Beslen. Annaliese is known today as "Anne Frank." - A list of 700 men and 300 women needed to work in a munitions factory in Brnenec-Brunnlitz in the Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia. The factory was owned by Oskar Schindler. - An April 20 "Totenbuch" [or "death book"] recording the execution of one prisoner every two minutes. The most moving and fascinating part of 60 Minutes' piece is that the show invited Walter Feiden, Miki Schwartz, and Jack Rosenthal to visit Bad Arolsen. The three men are the first Holocaust survivors to enter the archive, and the Red Cross located documents for each. You can watch the 60 Minutes story, in its entirety, online at: http://tinyurl.com/yhx837 This link will open a new browser window and resize it to the width of CBS' embedded video player, so be ready for that. The video is just under 13 minutes long. International Tracing Service http://www.its-arolsen.org/ Source: Tourbus, http://www.tourbus.com