Our heroes: Is there one in us all?

Pioneer Press ^ | 12-24-14 | Richard Chin

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Do the right thing. Help others. Can heroism be as simple as that? Leo Thorsness swore an oath when he became a Boy Scout in Walnut Grove, Minn., eventually becoming an Eagle Scout. He took another oath when he joined the Air Force, eventually becoming a fighter pilot in Vietnam. He received the Medal of Honor for a mission in which he risked himself to help downed crewmen from another aircraft. But the only living Medal of Honor recipient from Minnesota said he later came to realize he could boil down those service oaths to a simple code: Do the right thing.

Leo Thorsness, the only living Medal of Honor recipient from Minnesota, received the award in 1973 for a mission that occurred on April 19, 1967, while he was piloting an F-105 aircraft, the type seen in this picture, in action over North Vietnam. (Photo courtesy of the U.S. Department of Defense and the Congressional Medal of Honor Society.) Help others. Simple, but not always easy.

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Courage can be in all of us. All it is, is overcoming fear and self interest and it can be developed in us, just like muscles.

I have seen a lot of scared people in combat and most of them were heroes despite that fear.