A New Century of Heroes

There are heroes who walk among us: the clam digger who rescues a man from a burning retirement home; the dancer who prevents a robber from shooting two policemen at a nightclub; the former Marine, blinded during the Korean War, who saves two women from drowning in a river. What they have in common—besides the willingness to risk their own lives to save that of a friend or a stranger—is an unwillingness to brag about their actions.

In 1904, moved by the stories of two men who died trying to ...