WEBVTT

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(peaceful piano music)

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- Hi everyone, this is Chaplain Burson,

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and today's thought is about value.

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In the 1930s and 40s,
Hedy Lamarr was known

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as the most beautiful woman in the world.

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She started in over 30 films

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with actors like Clark
Gable and Jimmy Stewart,

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often playing an exotic temptress.

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She had one of the most
recognizable faces of her time,

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but she felt that she was never truly seen

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for who she really was.

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While other actors went out to
glamorous parties after work,

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Lamarr went home and worked
on her ideas and inventions.

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She was never trained as an engineer,

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but she was born with an inventive mind.

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When Howard Hughes was trying to design

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the world's fastest airplane,

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Lamarr felt that their
forms were too boxy.

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So she looked in the books

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for the shape of the fastest
fish and the fastest birds

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and combined them to
create her own design.

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When she showed it to Hughes,

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he called her a genius

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and used it to break the
world airspeed record.

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During World War II,

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Lamarr developed an idea

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for radio controlled torpedoes

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whose transmissions could not be jammed

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because they would change radio signals

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in sync with each other.

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She called this signal hopping

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and received the patent for it.

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But when Lamar presented
the idea to the Navy,

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she was rejected,

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and told that her services

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would be better used
raising money for the war,

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rather than trying to invent technology.

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Though Lamarr was disappointed,

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she wanted to help any way she could.

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So she sold over $25 million in war bonds,

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which is $343 million today.

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Years later, the Navy seized her patent

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as the property of an enemy alien,

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since she was from Austria.

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And eventually, it was
used in all of their ships.

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Today, we use signal hopping

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in everything from WiFi and cell phone

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to the military's most secret satellites.

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Hedy Lamarr never received
any compensation for her work,

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but she did receive an award

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recognizing her pioneering idea in 1997.

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She said, several times in her life,

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"My beauty is my curse,"

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because people never seem
to get past her face.

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Unfortunately, as Lamarr got older,

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Hollywood wanted younger
actresses with younger faces,

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and so it became harder and
harder to find acting roles.

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She had numerous facial surgeries

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trying to hold on to the only
thing she felt valued for,

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but for some of the procedures
they weren't done well,

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and Lamarr spent her final years secluded,

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even from her family,

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choosing only to talk
with them on the phone.

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2014, she was posthumously inducted

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into the National Inventors Hall of Fame.

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The story of Hedy Lamarr

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is an excellent reminder that

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we need to have the humility

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to know that sometimes
we miss seeing value

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in the places it exists,

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including in ourselves.

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This week, I hope that
we will have the courage

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to cultivate it,

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even when others don't see it,

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because when we wager our worth

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with what other people think of us

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then we gamble with our true value.

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Blessings this week.