Mattie Stepanek – A Child Peacemaker Of His Time

Legacy was not defined by how many years someone has worked. It is determined by the work done during the life span, even when it is too short. An example of this is Mattie JT Stepanek, who lived only for 13 years but set himself as a Prodigy.

Personal Life Of Mattie Stepanek

Matthew Joseph Thaddeus Stepanek, whom we know as Mattie JT Stepanek, was born on July 17, 1990, in Maryland. He was an American poet. When he was too young, his parents had divorced.

In Upper Marlboro, Maryland, he was grown up and later in Rockville, Maryland.

He considered the former US president Jimmy Carter as his hero. Jimmy Carter described him as “The most extraordinary person whom I have ever known.”

During his lifetime, He had published seven best-selling books of poetry and peace essay. 

In 2001 he met his hero Jimmy Carter on Good Morning America.

His three wishes:

He started writing at the age of three after the death of his brother Jimmie. He had three wishes at that time:

• To meet his hero Jimmy Carter.
• Wish to publish his poetry.
• To appear on The Oprah Winfrey Show.

 His first wish was completed. He met Carter, and Carter wrote the foreword for his second collection, Journey through Heartsongs.

He met Cheryl Barnes when he was in the children’s hospital, Washington. Along with her husband, Cheryl Barnes had begun VSP Books, a small press in Alexandria, Virginia, in 1992. Stepanek’s second wish was completed through Cheryl Barnes, who published 200 copies of his first collection, Heartsongs.

Heartsongs consists of twenty-eight pages written when Stepanek was between three and six years old. Within one hour after his first poetry published, all edition was bought by his friends and family. He appeared in the profile of Washingtons’ Post.  After his first book , Oprah Winfrey got to know about his wish of meeting her. After the publication of his second book, Journey through Heartsongs, he decided to have an entire show with Stepanek. Oprah called him “ a messenger of our time.” In this way, he completed all his wishes.

Awards:

He received  Melinda Lawrence International Book Award for inspirational written works from Children’s Hospice International in 1999.  In 2004 he got the award for Nu Skin Enterprises’s Nu Skin Force for Good Foundation Lifetime Achievement Award. In 2007, after three years of his death, he got the independent publishers ‘Peacemaker of the year’ award.

Death:

 He has suffered from a rare disorder, dysautonomic mitochondrial disease.  Earlier the condition was known, but in 1992, his mother was diagnosed with mitochondrial disorder; after all four children were born. The rare illness came from the mother to the children. Mattie Stepanek died on June 22, 2004, at Children’s National Medical Center, Washington DC, at just 13. His all siblings died due to the same disorder.

Shortly after the death of Stepanek in 2004, a group of people from Rockville, Maryland, established a non-profit foundation named “Mattie J.T. Stepanek Foundation. 

His life may be short, but what he did in it is nothing less, and it is enough to call him a “Prodigy.”

Also Read : William Cullen Bryant|A Multi-Talented Former Child Prodigy