Beside everyone who changed history, there was one person who believed in them first.

From the record

Moments when one person changed another

Only what biographies and the people’s own letters confirm.

• 

  Anne Sullivan → Helen Keller

  In April 1887, Sullivan let water from a pump run over one of Keller’s hands and spelled w-a-t-e-r into the other. That day Keller first understood that words name things. Sullivan stayed by her side until her death in 1936.

  Source: Helen Keller, The Story of My Life (1903)

• 

  Ryu Seong-ryong → Yi Sun-sin

  In 1591, Ryu Seong-ryong recommended Yi Sun-sin, then a county magistrate, to command the Left Jeolla Navy. The Imjin War began the next year.

  Source: Ryu Seong-ryong, Jingbirok

• 

  Theo van Gogh → Vincent van Gogh

  While his brother’s paintings barely sold, Theo sent him money to live on and, letter after letter, believed in his work. About 650 of Vincent’s letters to Theo survive.

  Source: Van Gogh Museum, Vincent van Gogh – The Letters

• 

  C.S. Lewis → J.R.R. Tolkien

  Tolkien wrote: “Only from him did I ever get the idea that my ‘stuff’ could be more than a private hobby.” For a long time Lewis was his only audience.

  Source: Tolkien’s letter (1965), The Letters of J.R.R. Tolkien

• 

  G.H. Hardy → Srinivasa Ramanujan

  In 1913, Hardy didn’t set aside a formula-filled letter from a clerk at the Madras Port Trust — he wrote back. The next year Ramanujan came to Cambridge.

  Source: G.H. Hardy, Ramanujan (1940)

• 

  Walter Sisulu → Nelson Mandela

  Sisulu found the young Mandela, newly arrived in Johannesburg, a job at a law firm — and led him toward politics.

  Source: Nelson Mandela, Long Walk to Freedom (1994)