August 16, 2012 - Henry Had Dreams

by Melinda Pillsbury-Foster 

Henry Story, born in 1941, was raised here. As a small child he began to dream of places far away with an intensity which called to him.

Henry's parents, Henry Senior and Iola, came to Ohio from Arkansas in 1940's so Henry's dad could work in a war plant.

After the war, the family moved to a dairy farm in Windsor, Ohio. The elder Henry began milking cows, planting oats and wheat, to be used as fodder for the cows, also raising hogs, chickens and ducks. “They did the whole deal,” as Henry, Jr. put it.

Later, the family moved to East Trumbull. Home was down a dirt road a mile and a half long with no close neighbors. There was no electricity and the water came from a hand pump in the kitchen.

During winter, Henry walked the mile and a half to the bus because the bus could not make it down the road through the snow. He attended school in Rock Creek. His favorite subject, then and today, is history. History takes us out of ourselves in many directions and Henry had already decided on the direction for his life.

Since his earliest years Henry had experienced two dreams. The first was a shiny gold disk with wings. When young Henry saw the disk in his dream he felt himself lifting out of his body and seeing the world from very different perspectives. The second dream, which also recurred, was of a bull, which chased him. He would run, levitating himself into the tree. The disk, he later realized, was the ancient symbol of the Rosicrucian Order. He remembered a reincarnation in China and studying at the Shaolin Temple in China.

Henry's study of martial arts began by watching Little Ricky on Ozzie and Harriet, after the family had a television.

At age 19 Henry left Ashtabula County to study martial arts. He returned in Ashtabula in 1985 where he began sharing his mastery at the YMCA and later at the Wellness and Total Learning Center. He taught martial arts, and also his philosophy, continuing his own studies until last November, when he suffered a stroke. As he has recovered, his studies have served him well.

Today he is a student in the Qi Gong class he once taught. Now nearly blind, he continues to seek wisdom and solutions which heal body, mind, and spirit.