Louis Zamperini (1917–2014),
a son of Italian immigrants, was a world-class runner and an Olympic athlete,
competing at the 1936 Games in Berlin. At the peak of his career, he left
sports to fight for his country as a bombardier in the US Army Air Forces. When
his B-24 crashed over the Pacific Ocean in 1943, he was stranded at sea for forty-seven
days, only to be captured by the Japanese and held prisoner for over two years.
After the war, he returned to the United States and founded the Victory Boys
Camp for wayward youth and became an inspirational speaker. Zamperini’s story
was told in his autobiography Devil at My
Heels and made famous in Laura Hillenbrand’s phenomenal #1 bestselling
biography Unbroken, which has been
made into a major motion picture directed by Angelina Jolie. |