A lifetime spent in service to his fellowman.

Earl Nightingale (1921 –1989) was an American motivational speaker and author, known as the "Dean of Personal Development." He was the voice in the early 1950s of Sky King, the hero of a radio adventure series [1], and was a WGN radio show host from 1950 to 1956. Nightingale was the author of the Strangest Secret.

Even as a small boy, Earl wondered why his family lived as they did, in a tent in Tent City with poverty all around them, while others lived so much better than they, and not finding answers to his questioning mind, he went to the Public library to search for the answers - - this search would continue for many years as he studied the world’s great religions, philosophy and psychology.

When Nightingale was seventeen he joined the United States Marines. He was on the USS Arizona during the attack on Pearl Harbor and was one of twelve surviving Marines on board that day. Before being mustered, Nightingale was an instructor at Camp Lejeune, North Carolina.

After the war Nightingale began work in the radio industry, which eventually led to work as a motivational speaker. In the fall of 1949, Nightingale was inspired while reading Think and Grow Rich by Napoleon Hill. Quoting from the Earl Nightingale official website:

When he was 29, Earl's enlightenment had come to him as a bolt out of the blue while reading, "Think and Grow Rich". It came when he realized that the six words he read were the answer to the question he had been looking for! That, “we become what we think about”. He he realized that he had been reading the same truth over and over again, from the New Testament, in the sayings of Buddha, in the writings of Lao Tse, to the works of Emerson. “We become what we think about.” “As ye sow, so shall ye reap.”"As the horse goes, so follows the cart."

In 1956 he produced a spoken word record, The Strangest Secret, which sold over a million copies, making it the first spoken-word recording to achieve Gold Record status.

Nightingale’s radio program, Our Changing World, became the most highly syndicated radio program ever, and was heard across the United States, Canada, Mexico, Australia, New Zealand, Fiji, South Africa, the Bahamas, 23 countries overseas, as well as the Armed Forces Network.
Sources:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Earl_Nightingale
http://www.earlnightingale.com/Home_Page.html
[1] Sky King is a 1940s and 1950s American radio and television adventure series. The title character is Arizona rancher and aircraft pilot Schuyler (or Skyler) "Sky" King. The series was likely based on a true-life person, Jack Cones, the Flying Constable of Twentynine Palms during the 1930s.
Although it had strong cowboy show elements, King always captured criminals and even spies and found lost hikers using his plane.

King's personal plane was called the Songbird. Though he changed from one plane to another over the course of the series, the later plane was not given a number (i.e., Songbird II), but was simply known as Songbird. [Songbird III a 1960 Cessna 310-D shown]

He and his niece, Penny (and sometimes Clipper, his nephew) lived on the Flying Crown Ranch, near the (fictitious) town of Grover, Arizona. Penny and Clipper were also pilots, though still relatively inexperienced and looking to their uncle for guidance and mentoring. Penny was an accomplished air racer and rated multi-engine pilot, who Sky trusted to fly the Songbird.


Taken in 1952 on the set of Sky King, with actors Gloria Winters(Penny), Kirby Grant (Sky King) and Ron Hagerthy( Clipper King).