Physical Handicaps

Åhlstad, Simon

Åhlstad was born in India and adopted by a Swedish family in 1974. He suffered from polio as a child but has become a champion swimmer. In the 1992 Barcelona Paralympics he won the 200 mete... [more]

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Terupe, Tui

Rupe was orphaned by the age of 10 and spent the rest of his childhood in children's homes and boarding schools. He was blind from birth in one eye, and during adolescence the sight in his ... [more]

Tenskwatawa

Tenskwatawa (Open Door) was one of triplet boys (one source states that he and Tecumseh were twin brothers). Their father, Pucksinwa, was killed in a battle with white men (1774) before t... [more]

Tekakwitha, Kateri

Tekakwitha was orphaned by smallpox as a child of four in New York State (and was herself visually handicapped and scarred by the disease) and raised by relatives. In 1676 she converted to ... [more]

Roberts, Ernie (see Deacon, Joseph John)

Deacon was born with severe cerebral palsy of the entire body. His mother died when he was six and he went to live with his grandmother. When he was eight, after a number of operations, he ... [more]

Rat-Children of Shah Daula

According to a centuries-old tradition, barren women who worship at the shrine of the Sufi saint Shah Daula, in Gujrat, Pakistan, will become fertile. But unless they donate their first-bor... [more]

Oldfield, Bruce

Oldfield was a Barnardo boy from birth. He was then fostered by a family in Durham but when a teenager his behavior was so difficult that he had to go back to a children's home for a few ye... [more]

Oedipus

Oedipus was the son of King Laius of Thebes and Queen Jocasta. There was a prophecy that Laius would be killed by his own son, so the baby was abandoned on a mountainside to die. (This was ... [more]

Moses

According to the Bible (Exodus 1-2) Moses was fostered or adopted after his mother, Jochebed, placed him in a basket on the Nile (compare Maui and Romulus and Remus ) to escape an edict ... [more]

Lemke, Leslie

Lemke was born prematurely in Milwaukee and placed for adoption at birth. While still in the hospital awaiting placement he was diagnosed with retrolental fibroplasia (caused by too much ox... [more]

von Kleist, Heinrich

von Kleist was born into the Prussian officer class, one of seven children of the two marriages of his father, who died in 1788. von Kleist was soon sent away to Berlin to be raised by a Lu... [more]

Deacon, Joseph John

Deacon was born with severe cerebral palsy of the entire body. His mother died when he was six and he went to live with his grandmother. When he was eight, after a number of operations, he ... [more]

Cullen, Eric Robertson

Cullen was adopted and had achondroplasia, a type of dwarfism. (He was adopted at birth because his mother was unmarried and unable to care for him; his achondroplasia was not diagnosed unt... [more]

Caines, Michael

Caines is a transracial adoptee, born in Jamaica and raised in Exeter. He was trained as a chef by Raymond Blanc. In 1994 he lost his right arm in a car accident, but with hard work, dedica... [more]

Wiles, Terry

Wiles was a Thalidomide baby, with no useful arms or legs and with only one functional eye, born to a poor, unmarried woman who abandoned him in the hospital. He spent the first years of... [more]