The human mind is amazingly resilient, which becomes evident in so many different ways. One is Savant Syndrome, in which a person who is disabled in some way develops a very strong ability in some other area. Some were born this way; others changed due to a brain injury. A brain hemorrhage led one man to start painting obsessively at age 51. A traumatic injury left a child with an estimated IQ of 40, yet he became a world-class sculptor. And there are two sets of twins who are autistic but can calculate numbers instantly, such as dates for any year. Tom Wiggins was a blind child musical prodigy who demonstrated how he could hear a song once and play it on piano. He could even do this with two songs played at the same time!
Born a slave, Tom Wiggins’ abilities were soon discovered by his white masters, and they began touring him around the southern US. It’s estimated that Tom’s owner made about $18,000 off him per year. It wasn’t long before “Blind Tom” became a sensation. He had a remarkable ability to mimic nearly every sound he heard, and it was claimed that he could perfectly reproduce the sound of any animal. Tom could play a piece with his back to the piano and could play one song with his right hand, another song with his left, and sing a third at the same time.