90 years old, wonderful

James Henry was born in Portugal and immigrated to the United States with his parents. The family was in trouble because of his father’s alcoholism and gambling, so Henry, 6 years old, became a newsboy on the streets. After growing up, Henry worked as a construction worker, worked as a baker, and even worked as a boxer. After accumulating some money, he bought a small fishing boat to catch lobster. Although he is illiterate, it does not affect his lobster business. A few years later, he bought several big ships and hired a lot of workers to become the famous "Lobster King". Despite his huge fortunes, he felt very inferior because he was an illiterate.

Once, he bought a limousine. When applying for a driver's license, the staff asked him to fill in the personal information on the form. He grabbed the pen and was sweating. Fortunately, his good friend helped him solve the problem. Another time, he went to a restaurant to eat. Because he couldn't read the menu, he waited until the food on the neighboring table was finished. He told the waiter to give him another copy according to the neighboring table. He was therefore ridiculed by the waiter. Later, he had planned to learn literacy many times, but because he was busy with business, he did not expect that he was dragged to the age of 90.

One day, the granddaughter read a passage from the American writer George Dawson, "Life is so beautiful," which tells the grandson of a slave to learn to read at the age of 98. Henry suddenly said: "He can do it, I can do it too." The children advised him, you are so old, and you still learn literacy? You don't know a word, don't you do business too much? "Henry said: "I don't want to go to see God without a little culture. ”

From that day on, 90-year-old Henry learned literacy from scratch, and the difficulties can be imagined. He learns from the alphabet, then learns words with the help of children's lexicons, and often learns late at night. Sometimes I fell asleep without knowing it. After being awakened by the book that fell to the ground, I picked up the book and continued to learn. Later, he met the literacy volunteer Mark Hogan, and the literacy speed was even more rapid. With more and more literacy, his "ambition" is getting bigger and bigger. He wants to write the legendary experience of his life as a book. Encouraged by Hogan, he began to write autobiographies at the desk every day. The table was full of books such as dictionaries, and he often called Hogan for advice.

A year and a half later, when Henry was 100 years old, his autobiography "A Fisherman's Language" was published. In an interview, Henry said: "I am very excited at the age of 90. I will do it, you must do it!"