"It Won't Stop You"

Aussie Billionaire Has Message For Kids Who Stutter

By Lucy Dean

John Andrew Henry Forrest, nicknamed Twiggy, is an Australian businessman. He is best known as the former CEO of Fortescue Metals Group, with other interests in the mining industry, cattle stations, and aquaculture (the rearing of aquatic animals or the cultivation of aquatic plants for food). With an assessed net worth of $23 billion (according to the Financial Review 2020 Rich List), Forrest was ranked as the second richest Australian.

Emily Blunt, Joe Biden, Samuel L Jackson, Bruce Willis and Aussie billionaire, Andrew ‘Twiggy’ Forrest, all have one thing in common: they grew up with speech disorders or stutters.

In an interview to mark International Stuttering Awareness Day on 22 October, Forrest said his stutter is just part of his personality.

"You'll either grow out of it or it will grow with you but it won't stop you," Forrest told the Australian Speak Easy Association (ASEA).

"What I'd say to every kid and adult out there: 'it's part of your beautiful personality, it's part of who you are'. You can live full, rich and happy lives."

The campaign is to fight stigma around speech disorders, with ASEA president Vikesh Anand saying the condition is often misunderstood.

Forrest said he first became aware of his stutter around year three or four, but by 10 years old, he knew he “just had to get out of this somehow”.

"The more important the words were, the less I could say them,” he said. “It didn’t matter what the words were. At first I thought it was anything beginning with ‘w’ and then it was anything beginning with ‘m’... I just found if I really had to say something, I couldn’t say it.”

"My father said that he had a stutter as a kid and he said he got over it and he said 'you will too'."

However, he tackled his speech disorder through a “crash or crash-through” mentality, which saw him using a two-way radio as part of his schooling and even joining his school’s debating team.

"I was really pleased that my friends around me said 'Yeah look, have a go Twiggy, what's the worst that could happen? You'll stutter?'" he said.

"I knew that when I put my hand up to join the house debating team that people would be swinging off the rafters to see this kid with a stutter have to debate." He described the debates as “gladiatorial battles” at his school, but he just focused on practicing.

He said it was “one of the most terrifying things” he’s ever done, but it took the worst out of his stutter.

However, that doesn’t mean he lives without a stutter: Forrest said he still stutters today.

But, he said, the stutter gives him some time to think.

Article originally published by Yahoo Finance on October 22, 2020
https://au.finance.yahoo.com/news/andrew-forrest-opens-up-about-his-stutter-211144888.html?soc_src=community&soc_trk=ma

From the 2021 Winter Magazine

CELEBRITY FOCUS

Bob Love

Bob Love has dreamt about being a great public speaker since his early days in Bastrop Louisiana, even though, as a young man, he could barely put two words together, let alone speak a full sentence.

In spite of his severe stuttering disability, Bob Love, the son of a sharecropper, rose to become a Chicago Bulls NBA superstar, whose records were eventually surpassed by Michael Jordan. Throughout his entire athletic career, Bob Love kept his stuttering a secret from the fans who adored him, thinking he could do his “talking” on the basketball court.

Mel Tillis

Mel Tillis, born Lonnie Melvin Tillis, was an influential figure in country music, both as a songwriter and a performer. His journey to fame was marked by overcoming personal challenges, including a stutter that he turned into a defining part of his public persona.

Bill Withers

While Bill Withers has long been on the Stuttering Foundation's list of Famous People Who Stutter, many people probably didn’t realize he stuttered. He passed away on March 30, 2020.

Born in 1938 in Slab Fork, W.V., Withers was the youngest of six children. When his father died when Withers was small, he was raised by his mother and grandmother, both of whom worked as domestics.

King George

In November 2010, worldwide movie audiences were presented with a most interesting and unusual movie release with The King’s Speech, starring Colin Firth as King George VI and Helena Bonham Carter as his wife Elizabeth.

Unfortunately, history may have forgotten the courageous and inspiring story of Prince Albert who stuttered badly and never dreamed that he would ever be king when his older brother, King Edward VIII, abruptly abdicated the throne in 1936 to marry Wallis Simpson, an American divorcee.

Ken Venturi

As much of the nation watches the U.S. Open Golf Championship, it is impossible not to think about our late friend Ken Venturi. Ken overcame many challenges to win the Open at Congressional in 1964 and go on to become the voice of golf for more than three decades.

However, Ken faced no bigger obstacle than stuttering. Ken Venturi was a champion to those who stutter, going out of his way to share his personal experience when consulted by a colleague, friend, or child who stutters.