Quiet Hero (edit title/settings)

Ridiculously Simplified Synopsis edit

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People edit see section history

• Rita Cosby: The author is a news reporter who has worked for MSNBC and Fox News.
• Alan Cosby: Rita's brother
• Adda Cosby: Rita's mother.
• Ryszard Kossobudzki aka Richard Roger Cosby aka Rys: Rita's 84-year-old father.
• Judy: Father's second wife.
• Dr. David Kelsen: Chief of Gastrointestinal Oncology at Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center.
• Pope John Paul II: Person Rita had interviewed.
• Son of Sam: Person Rita had interviewed.
• Tomaczek: Rita's boyfriend for ten years.
• Eric Cosby: Son of Richard and Judy Cosby. Rita's half-brother.
• Konstanty Kossobudzki: Rita's grandfather. Richard's father.
• Hanna Kossobudzki: Richard's mother.
• Adolf Hitler: German invader of Poland.
• Edward Rydz-Smigly: The commander-in-chief of Poland’s armed forces who evacuated Warsaw along with most of the government when Germany invaded.
• Yolanda: Richard's cousin in wartime Poland.
• Juliusz Rómmel: Polish major general for surrender to Germany. Right before the surrender, he secretly ordered the creation of the first Polish underground movement in WWII, so the Poles could organize their efforts against the Nazis.
• Heinrich Himmler: Germany’s minister of the interior and chief of police.
• Hans Frank: Hitler's personal lawyer who became head of the new German government in Poland, to exploit the country and loot anything of value, then tear apart its economic, cultural, and political makeup.
• Stanislaw Srzednicki aka Lieutenant Stan: Leader of the youth resistance.
• Ewa: A girl Richard liked during the war until he learned she was associated with partial Germans.
• Rita: Richard's cousin in Poland. Rita Cosby's namesake. Resistance fighter. Ended up in German prison camp. Went to England after war, married and moved to Canada.
• Slobodan Milosevic: President of Serbia and Yugoslavia interviewed by Rita Cosby after he was arrested.
• Stan Aronson: Eighty-four year old Jewish Warsaw Ghetto survivor who now lives in Tel Aviv, Israel.
• Tadeusz Bor-Komorowski: General. Chief commander of the Home Army for the Uprising.
• Nina Polan: Director of the Polish Theatre Institute. Rita interviewed her for book.
• Henryka "Henia" Zylak: Polish Resistance fighter who asked Richard to save last bullet to shot her. His girlfriend. She was killed when a booby-trapped tank exploded.
• Stanley "Tookie" Williams: Rita witnessed the execution of this former Crips gang leader at San Quuentin in December 2005.
• Rodney King: Rita covered the L.A. Riots after the Rodney King verdict.
• Yasser Arafat: Rita interviewed the Palestinian leader soon after 9/11.
• Ariel Sharon: Rita interviewed this Israeli prime minister.
• Teddy: Richard's favorite uncle who lived on Jerusalem Avenue and used to teach Richard English.
• Alex Chelmicki: Fellow prisoner Richard met in POW hospital in Zeithain and stayed with until the end of the war.
• Reverend A. W. Ishee: Former American Stalag IV-B POW. Eighty-five year-old pastor in Laurel, Mississippi. Author of Stalag IV-B: An Ex-POW Tells His Story.
• Mark Vonnegut: Sixty-two year old son of Kurt Vonnegut was interviewed by Rita about his father's reflections about Stalag IV B.
• Teofil Lachowicz: Historian for Polish Army Veterans Association of America.
• Marek Skulimowski: Deputy Polish consul general
• Bill Biega: An eighty-seven-year-old Polish Resistance fighter living in New Jersey who had beeon on the same prisoner war train as Richard.
• Marek Galezowski: Young Polish historian who wrote a book about the Young Eagles. Title: Orleta Warszawy, or Warsaw's Eaglets. Dedicated to Lieutenant Stan.
• Matt Chelmicki: Alex's son.
• Anna Sharpe: Alex's daughter.
• Dr. Mack Orsborn: VA physician for ex-POWS who Rita talked to about post traumatic stress disorder.
• Samuel Oliner: Professor emeritu of sociology at Humboldt State University in California. He had excaped Nazi execution and was saved by a Polish Catholic family. Rita talked to him.
• Robert Perloff: WWII army combat veteran and former psychologist at the University of Pittsburgh.
• Ewa Junczyk-Ziomecka: Secretary of State in the Polish President's Chancellery.
• Lech Kaczynski: President of Poland.
• Andrzej Wajda: Polish filmmaker.
• Tadeusz Goralski: 87-year-old former prisoner of war in Zeithain camp at same time as Richard.

Quotes edit see section history

• “No wonder my father used to tell us, “You cannot let evil roam unchallenged and that freedom is always worth fighting for.” Not a typical life lesson for a young girl in Greenwich, Connecticut. Cosby, Rita (2010). Quiet Hero (p. 83). Threshold Editions. Kindle Edition.”

• “‘The maggots have found you.’ The sight nearly made me sick, but the nurse seemed strangely pleased. ‘They’ll help to clean it,’ she said. ‘We don’t have much in the way of antiseptic.’ ” Cosby, Rita (2010). Quiet Hero (p. 178). Threshold Editions. Kindle Edition.”

• Popular Highlights from Kindle Customers

• “Courage is not the absence of fear. It’s the presence of resolve, the presence of purpose.”

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• Our greatest heroes will never admit it—it goes against the grain of the generosity in their souls. Heroes are often quiet people.

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• Stalag IV-B: An Ex-POW Tells His Story, and gotten in touch with the writer, Reverend A. W. Ishee.

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• “You cannot let evil roam unchallenged and that freedom is always worth fighting for.”

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• Andrzej Wajda, the award-winning Polish filmmaker whose movies about the Resistance are known around the world,

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• Many people accept relationships with parents or other loved ones as just being the way they are, distant or complicated, and feel the wall between

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• At its peak, only forty thousand men and women participated in the Warsaw Uprising. Yet the prewar population of Poland was approximately 35 million.

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• I’ve always been an optimist, but my relationship with my father was one challenge I was always pessimistic about.

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• “Don’t think that life is going to be fair or easy.”

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• My mother’s passing had made me realize that my dad was still alive, and that my time to get to know him was limited.

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Setting & Locations edit see section history

• Washington D.C.: Where Rita worked as network correspondent.
• Old Greenwich, Connecticut: Where Rita's mother lived
• New York City: Where Rita worked for Fox News.
• Stalag IV B: German POW camp where Rita's father was imprisoned. Near the town of Muhlberg and east of the Elbe River.
• Mount Desert Island in Maine: Where Rita's family went camping in the summers when she was a child.
• Somes Sound View Campground in Maine: Where the family camped.
• Bar Harbor, Maine: Where the Cosbys went boating in a seventeen-foot aluminum Grumman canoe.
• Somes Sound View Campground in Maine: Where the Cosbys camped.
• Alexandria, Virginia: Where Rita's father lives with Judy.
• Kings Street Station: Train stop in Alexandria, Virginia close to Rita's father's home.
• Fort Belvoir: Army base near where Rita's father lives
• The Pentagon: Near where Rita's father lives.
• Gleiwitz, Germany: Border town taken over by Germans dressed as Poles to justify retaliation against Poland.
• Romania: Where some Polish intelligentsia were told to go after the invasion of Germany.
• Vistula River, Poland: A place where Richard high school swim team held meets prior to the invasion of Germany.
• Warsaw, Poland: Capital city of Poland.
• Warsaw Ghetto: Where the Germans imprisoned the Jews in Poland and Polish dissidents.
• Auschwitz, Poland: German prisoner camp
• Treblinka, Poland: Where some of the Polish Jews were sent.
• Majdanek, Poland: Where some Polish Jews were sent.
• Kosovo: A place where Rita Cosby covered as a news reporter
• The Hague: Where Milosevic stood trial for war crimes.
• Tel Aviv, Israel: Where a Jewish Warsaw Ghetto survivor Stan Aronson now lives.
• Niagara Falls: A place Richard fantasized about during the war, especially when there was not enough water.
• Afghanistan: Where Rita went on news assignment.
• Germany: Where Rita went on way to Afghanistan.
• San Quetin: Rita witnessed the execution of former Crips gang leader Stanley "Tookie" Williams there in December 2005.
• The sewers of Warsaw: Escape route use by more than five thousand Polish Resistance members during a 24-hour period.
• Zeithain, Germany: An hour north of Dresden. Where Richard was taken to POW hospital.
• Battle of the Bulge: Where some of the American POWs had fought.
• Dresden, Germany: Richard was close enough to know when it was bombed in February 1945.
• Grimma, Germany: Where American forces where when Richard and a thousand others escaped from Stalag IV B.
• Italy: Richard and other Polish fighters who had escaped joined the Polish II Corps of the British army based in Italy.
• Glasgow, Scotland: Where Richard transferred to after Italy.
• Gloucestershire: Where Richard ended up after Scotland.
• Bristol, England: Where Alex went to work after the war.
• University of London: Where Richard went after the war. Graduated in 1954 as a civil engineer. Met Rita's mother.
• Warsaw Rising Museum: Where Richard and Rita visited.
• Auschwitz-birkenau: Concentration camp memorial near Warsaw.

Organizations edit see section history

• Girl Scouts: Rita sold cookies as a child and knew her father had been a scout in Poland.
• Boston Marathon: Where Rita's father ran.
• Marine Corps Marathon: Where Rita's father ran. Won the seventy and older division.
• The American Red Cross: Richard supported this organization after moving to America. Red Cross helped while he was POW in Germany.
• Armia Krajowa aka AK: Polish Resistance, or home army
• Young Eagles: Polish version of boy scouts. Later became an official part of the Resistance,
• NATO: North Atlantic Treaty Organization. Milosevic blamed NATO for Serbian deaths.
• Gozdawa Battalion: Richard's unit in Polish resistance.
• Kosciuszko Foundation: An organization that promotes Polish-American culture and education with exhibits of photos and discussions about the Warsaw Uprising. In New York City.
• Polish Theatre Institute: Rita interviewed them about the use of radio waves by resistance during the Uprising.
• Landstuhl Regional Medical Center: In Germany. Where Rita went on the way to Afghanistan.
• The Crips: Rita witnessed the execution of former Crips gang leader Stanley "Tookie" Williams at San Quentin in December 2005.
• Montana Freemen: A Christian Patriot movement near the town of Jordan, Montana, who became known in 1996 for a prolonged armed standoff with agents of the Federal Bureau of Investigation. Rita got an exclusive interview by holding hands in the air.
• Polish Army Veterans Association of America: Headquartered in New York City and museum.
• Association of Fighters for Independence: Polish military group originated in 1939.

First Sentence edit see section history

Table of Contents edit see section history

Series & Lists edit see section history

List the series to which this book belongs.

Authors & Contributors edit see section history

1. Rita Cosby (Author)

Classification edit see section history

• Library of Congress: Add the Library of Congress Classification.
• Dewey: 940.547243

Subjects edit see section history

• Books › History › Military › World War II
• Books › Biographies & Memoirs › Leaders & Notable People › Military
• Books › Biographies & Memoirs › Memoirs

Books Cited by This Book edit see section history