When I started this thread, I didn't anticipate where it would lead. Many of you have posted very informative and thoughtful comments. In re-reading this thread, I remembered a heroic rescue I witnessed some years ago:

My fishing partner and I had just pulled into the boat launch on the Skykomish River, at Sultan, Washington, USA. We had hired a professional river guide to help us catch steelhead. As we were unloading the boat at the "take out spot," I looked upstream and saw a horrible scene.

It was summertime and five teen-agers were drifting down the river on inner tubes and cheap plastic boats. They were drinking, and sunburned and mostly tired. As I watched, one kids drifted into a "sleeper," a log mostly under the water. As he passed over, his leg got caught and he went under. We could see one arm flailing above the water.

"Terry," our river guide was still in the drift boat, handing out stuff to us. I yelled at him and pointed at the kid. He told me to shove him and the boat out into the stream.

By himself, he rowed that McKenzie (sp?) drift boat across the strong current, threw a rope on the tree, and single handedly hauled that kid into the boat. He then bagged him a couple of times, threw off the rope and started drifting downstream.

We caught the boat a hundred yards downstream and hauled the kid out of the boat. The medics came and he lived, though I think he lost his foot.

I knew several reporters with my town newspaper and called one of them about this incident. The reporter I called drove out to Terry's house to interview him. Terry turned him down. He said that he didn't do anything special ... "anyone would have done the same."

It's incidents like this, and we all know them, that make me wonder just what the concept of "hero" is all about. It obviously isn't for the person that does the "heroic act." Maybe it's just that all of us "non-heros" want somebody we can look up to?

I dunno? Food for thought, I guess. CHEERS, Bob