Beliefnet is asking its readers to choose the most inspirational person of the year. They’ve narrowed it down to 10 people. At this moment, the leader in the voting, with 81 percent, is Liviu Librescu, a Virginia Tech professor who saved many of his students by barricading the door to his classroom during the shooting there that claimed more than 30 lives last April.
Mr. Librescu, 76, was shot to death by the deranged assailant, Cho Seung-Hui. The professor of engineering science and mechanics was a Holocaust survivor.
It appears that Mr. Librescu will win the contest by a large margin. His closest competitor, with just 4 percent of the vote, is Wesley Autrey, who saved a man who had fallen onto the subway tracks in New York City. In third place is Angelina Jolie, who is known for her humanitarian work, and for being very pretty. —Thomas Bartlett
