No Ears: How Napoleon Hill Helped His Son Blair to Hear

 

No Ears: How Napoleon Hill Helped His Son Blair to Hear

 

Of all the success stories achieved by success guru Napoleon Hill, none was more challenging nor more gratifying than teaching his son Blair, born without ears, to hear.

 

Success guru Oliver Napoleon Hill (October 26, 1883 – November 8, 1970) gleaned his philosophy for fulfillment and success in life from interviews with wealthy men of great accomplishment as well as from his own personal experiences.

 

Of all the success stories which Napoleon's philosophy and writings engendered, none was more personally gratifying to him than that of his second son, Napoleon Blair Hill (November 11, 1912 - August 31, 1975).

 

Blair was born in Fairmont, "The Friendly City," where the Tygart Valley River joins the West Fork River to form the Monongahela River in West Virginia. At birth, Blair was discovered to lack "any physical sign of ears," and the doctor opined that the child "might be deaf, and mute for life."

 

The external ear is known medically as auricle (Latin: auricula, from auris "ear" + -cula, diminutive suffix) or pinna (Latin: penna, "fin, wing"). Its underdevelopment, malformation or absence is a congenital defect, attributed to the lack of development of auricular tissues, which normally occurs in the fifth week of fetal life. Complete absence of the external ear and the auditory canal constitutes anotia (Greek: ἀ-/ἀν-, a-/an-, "without" + οὖς, ὠτ-, ous, ōt-, "ear"). Malformation or underdevelopment (hypoplasia) is termed as microtia (Greek: μικρός, mikros, "small" + οὖς, ὠτ-, ous, ōt-, "ear").

 

 

These disorders are relatively common, with an occurrence of 1 in every 6,000 to 12,000 live births. Anotia-microtia, which most commonly occurs in males, Japanese, and Navajos (Diné or Naabeehó), a southwestern Native American tribe, is found rarely in Hispanic populations.

External ear defects may occur on one (unilateral) or both (bilateral) sides of the head. In over 80 percent of the cases of anotia and microtia, only one side is affected, occurring usually on the right side.

 

Blair was diagnosed with bilateral microtia.

 

 

Napoleon's reaction to the diagnosis was a silent vow, deep in his heart, to find a way for Blair to learn to hear and to speak. His determination was inspired by favorite words from Transcendentalist essayist-lecturer-poet Ralph Waldo Emerson (May 25, 1803–April 27, 1882):

"The whole course of things goes to teach us faith. We need only obey. There is guidance for each of us, and by lowly listening, we shall hear the right word."

 

The right word for Napoleon was desire. He desired that Blair be able to hear and to speak. According to Napoleon's philosophy, all achievement begins with the first, empowering step of having a burning desire for a specific outcome. Now that Napoleon had identified his compelling desire, he intended to transplant into Blair's mind the same unswerving intention for auditory and vocal success.

Napoleon devoted a section, entitled "Desire Outwits Mother Nature," in the second chapter, "Desire: The First Step Toward Riches," of his bestselling masterpiece, Think and Grow Rich(1937), to narrating the attainment of his dream of normal hearing and speech for Blair. Napoleon's plan included:

• renewing his own pledge daily for Blair's wholeness;
• imparting his burning desire to Blair;
• not teaching sign language to Blair;
• mainstreaming Blair's education instead of sending him to a school for the deaf;
• 
  

creating bedtime stories for Blair with themes "designed to develop in him self-reliance, imagination, and a keen desire to hear and to be normal" as well as to establish the belief that"his affliction was not a liability, but an asset of great value"

Napoleon instilled in Blair the belief that the combination of his obvious earlessness, lack of self-consciousness, brightness, and industriousness would encourage peers, teachers, and all whom he met to display "special attention" and "extraordinary kindness" toward the boy. The astounding success which ensued was attributed by Napoleon, not to himself, but to Blair's empowering faith in the truth of his father's words. Indeed, the perspicacious boy certainly appreciated all the attention, efforts, and time which his busy father expended on assuring that "every adversity brings with it the seed of an equivalent advantage."

Consistent with Napoleon's philosophy of earnest, honest pursuit of dreams, he instilled in Blair an admirable code of conduct which gained easy acceptance for the bright lad. Throughout life, Blair was noted for his amiability and his diligence.

 

 

Importance of victrolas in Blair Hill's healing: picking up sound vibrations via bone conduction enabled Blair to "hear" music.

Two vignettes in Napoleon's section on enriching Blair's life are especially compelling and heart-warming as evidence of the commitment, on the part of both father and son, to Blair's healing.

The family purchased a victrola, a line of phonographs manufactured by Victor Talking Machine Company (1901-1929) from September 1906 through the 1970s. The hallmark of victrolas was a sleekly designed tabletop or floor console enclosing the turntable and amplifying horn. Blair immediately responded to the victrola, clamping his teeth down on the edge of the console and thereby hearing music through bone conduction, the conveyance of sound through the bones of the skull. Blair's favorite song was "It's a Long Way to Tipperary." On one occasion Napoleon noted that the determined tyke replayed the song again and again for over two hours.

• Composed in 1912 by entertainer Jack Judge (December 3, 1872-July 25, 1938), the ballad was intended to honor the songwriter's grandparents' ancestral hometown of Tipperary in South East Ireland. Nevertheless, the song quickly became popular during the First World War (July 28, 1914 - November 11, 1918) as a song epitomizing longing for home from distant lands. 

The second enchanting vignette was re-enacted lovingly, over and over, after Napoleon realized that Blair could hear, not just music, but his father's voice as well via bone conduction. Napoleon was able to convey words to his indomitable child by touching the mastoid bone behind Blair's ears with his lips as he spoke.

Unfortunately, Blair's attendance in public schools was not always welcomed by school officials. Nevertheless, Napoleon and his first wife, Florence Elizabeth Hornor Hill (b. 1888), persevered in their determination for Blair "to live a normal life, and associate with normal children, and we stood by that decision, although it cost us many heated debates with school officials." (p. 32) In his schooling, Blair could hear his teachers when they spoke close-by and loudly. Thus, he progressed through the grades and went on to pursue advanced education at the University of West Virginia, established in 1867 in Morgantown, in north central West Virginia. Yearbook photographs show a handsome, confidently unassuming young man who participated actively in campus life. As a junior in 1934, he served as treasurer for the Journaliers and belonged to Chi Sigma Delta Honorary Economics Fraternity.

Blair had tried hearing aids but had never found a device which worked for him. So, in his last year of college, he hesitated before testing an Acousticon hearing aid which was specifically designed for him by Dictograph Products Company, headquartered in New York City. Nevertheless, thehearing aid proved to be absolutely perfect for Blair, improving his hearing to 100 percent and thereby enabling him to hear and to converse at normal levels of conversation. He immediately telephoned his mother and was overjoyed to hear her voice perfectly. This was the most important turning point in Blair's life, for his and Napoleon's dream of normal hearing and speech was now fulfilled.

 

Consistent with Napoleon's philosophy of enriching the world through achievements, Blair next sought to determine a practical plan for converting his former handicap into an equivalent asset of value to others. He wrote to Dictograph to provide grateful feedback on their design. In response, he was invited to visit their headquarters and to tour their factory.

After his trip to New York City, Blair determined that his lifelong mission would be to "render useful service . . . . to bring hope and practical relief to thousands of deafened people who, without his help, would have been doomed forever to deaf mutism"

 

Next, Blair devoted a full month to researching Dictograph's marketing system and to devising a two-year plan for reaching out to those with hearing difficulties worldwide. Accepting Blair's proposal, Dictograph promptly hired him to implement the new plan. Thus, Blair's long journey to wholeness found fruition, as his seeming limitation finally, through faith and perseverance, was converted into a priceless asset, of value not just to himself but to multitudes.

 

Spinal column is focus of chiropractric, an alternative medicine focusing on health via spinal column and nervous system:

Napoleon Hill valued chiropractic adjustments which his son received as critical to Blair's against-all-odds success in hearing, despite being born without ears.

 

An important component of Blair's progress in childhood was disclosed decades later, in the late 1960s. In Teach-In News, one of the many newsletters penned by Napoleon, the success guru revealed that Blair was given weekly chiropractic adjustments, beginning at the age of eighteen months and continuing until the child was four years old. The two physicians who delivered the baby were Blair's uncles. They, along with Napoleon's wife and other relatives, did not approve of chiropractic as a complementary or an alternative therapy. Napoleon, however, persevered because of the toddler's undeniable progress. After the first month of thrice weekly adjustments, Blair would turn his head to acknowledge his father's hand clapping behind the infant's back. By the time that the adjustments were discontinued, Blair's natural hearing capacity had increased to 65 percent.

 

Actually it was not surprising that Blair's hearing was improved by spinal manipulation, for the discovery of chiropractic in September 1895 occurred via a janitor, Harvey Lillard (1856 - September 7, 1925), who visited magnetic healer Daniel David Palmer (March 7, 1845 - October 20, 1913). Harvey complained of persistent and increasing hearing loss subsequent to a minor back injury which had happened 17 years previously. Noting a segment of Harvey's spine which was prominently out of alignment with neighboring bones, D.D. Palmer applied pressure until the segment shifted back into place. A few hours later Harvey returned with the news of partial improvement in his hearing. A few visits later, Harvey completely regained his hearing. From this experience, D.D. Palmer postulated a connection between nerve pressure at the spinal level and functional problems in the nerve's area of influence. Thus, the healing therapy of chiropractic was formulated and developed.

 

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