He's lived the advice he gives: Dream big

YAKIMA, Wash. — Dan Miller doesn't let his motorized scooter slow him down. He charges fearlessly ahead and has little time to see if anyone else is following. But they do. By the thousands.

The 72-year-old Miller is one of Yakima's worst-kept secrets. His inspirational speeches have graced mammoth convention centers and small gatherings held in cramped community rooms.

Since 1990, more than 750,000 have listened and laughed at Miller's homespun anecdotes. I got a chance to hear him for the first time last month when he spoke at a conference I helped to organize here in Yakima for parents of children with special needs.

His self-published book --
"Living, Laughing and Loving Life!" -- has sold more than 70,000 copies, all by word of mouth and by personal appeal. He often autographs it with this simple advice: "Dream Big."

Indeed he does.

Miller had it made when he was an 18-year-old. Physically fit from growing up in the farming community of Pateros, Wash., the handsome teen was a gifted athlete, excelling in basketball, football and baseball.

Miller couldn't wait for the next stage in life -- to go to college and become a physical education teacher.

Then one day, in the summer of 1955 after his high school graduation, Miller came down with what he thought was the flu.

Now getting sick is no fun, but back in the 1950s, for a teenager to become ill, that was cause for panic -- far worse than our recent outbreak of the swine flu.

The culprit was polio, a virus that blocks messages to the nerves and causes paralysis and sometimes death. It had reached epidemic proportions and left in its wake the vivid images of children in wheelchairs and iron lung machines. By the summer of 1955, more than 60,000 had died and another 2 million had been disabled.

It was in that fateful year that Dr. Jonas Salk announced to the world he had developed a vaccine. But it took time for the Salk
vaccine to reach small farm-
ing communities like Pater-os, with its population of 700.

For Miller, it arrived three weeks too late.

Once able to hit jump shots from anywhere on the basketball court, Miller was paralyzed within a few days after falling ill.

At this point, his life had all the makings of a tragic tale to be told later by an embittered man grieving for what could have been.

But not for Dan Miller. After nearly 15 months of physical rehabilitation, he
refused to give up on his dream of attending college, and so that's exactly what he
did. He later earned a mas-ter's degree from Eastern Washington University and became a teacher, a physical education specialist and a principal in Prosser and Leavenworth, with several statewide awards to his credit.

Miller wanted to marry and raise a family. Those dreams came true, too. He and Judy, whom he met at college, will celebrate their 50th anniversary in August. They have three children and eight grandchildren.

The man with a paralyzed arm also dreamed of flying a plane and getting a pilot's license, and he accomplished those, too. He had to sit in the passenger's seat on the right side of the cockpit so he could work the controls with his left arm, but he succeeded. He even flew an ultralight, landing the flimsy aircraft in plowed fields and on dirt roads.

Oh, did I forget to mention the guitar? He wanted to play that, too. And be in a band, which he did for six years in his 20s.

Miller always dreamed big, and in his speeches and in his book, that's what he asks others to do as well.

He certainly never gave up his desire to be a physical education teacher after polio had struck and turned the mere act of walking into a series of comedic pratfalls.

However, imagine your-self sitting across from your college adviser insisting that you want to become a gym teacher even though you could no longer run or jump, climb a rope or do a push-up.

With his crutches at his side, Miller faced his adviser with his future hanging in the balance. Though the professor didn't know it at the time, he would become one of many dream makers in Miller's life.

"Well, let's see what you can do," the adviser said with a smile.

What a refreshing way to look at life. It's liberating, really. It certainly freed Dan Miller from the imprison-ment that polio had placed on him. He knew all too well
what he couldn't do. It was
more important to be encour-aged for what he could do.

And that was to dream big. Really big.

* Editorial Page Editor Spencer Hatton can be reached at 509-577-7704 or shatton@yakimaherald.com.

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