RUSH: Isaac in Arizona City, Arizona. It’s great to have you on the EIB Network. Hello.
CALLER: Hi. Thanks for taking my call, sir.
RUSH: You bet, sir.
CALLER: I called because I live here in Arizona and I went and voted this morning like everybody’s talking about. But I just wanted to call and thank you because my wife and I are raising our kids. They’re all Rush Babies. She was. Unfortunately, I didn’t listen to you until I turned 19 and I was still on active duty in the Marines. So when I heard that you were writing children’s books based on history, I was ecstatic. Because unfortunately, when I was little, I got basically the same history they’re getting now. But I knew stuff was missing, so I looked for it on my own. Well, then your books came out and I thought it was a perfect opportunity to read them to my kids. They enjoy them very much. Well, now they read them on their own. One of my kids, the middle one, he actually has special needs. He’s a moderate-functioning autistic. So it’s hard to get him to focus.
RUSH: How old is he?
CALLER: He is seven.
RUSH: Seven. Wow. Okay.
CALLER: Yeah, so it’s very hard to get him to focus, and he also has a Mixed Receptive-Expressive Language Disorder. So sometimes it’s very difficult for him to understand. But when I pick up a Rush Revere book or his brothers do, and they read it, it’s got his attention, and that to me is amazing.
RUSH: Oh.
CALLER: Anything to keep his attention. And he’s very, very hands on.
RUSH: What do you think it is about those books? ‘Cause I know behavioral patterns, and I know the challenges and all that, and there are varying degrees of this. What is it about the books, do you think, that focuses attention?
CALLER: The thing that he catches on to most is Liberty. Obviously most kids like Liberty. It’s his quips, it’s his quick wit, and he just seems to anticipate the next joke or the next funny comment that Liberty will make. He gets a kick out of it that a horse is saying these things, that a horse is doing it.
RUSH: Yeah, ’cause he’s a literalist, right, and horses don’t talk.
CALLER: Yes.
RUSH: And yet here’s a believable horse. So he keeps reading for the next instance of Liberty being a smart aleck?
CALLER: Yes. Yes.
RUSH: Wow.
CALLER: But he also retains the points that you make in between. Like I told the gentleman that took the call, my youngest is seven, and he very well quickly made the correlation between some of the things that, say, the king of England was doing and things he said to Elizabeth and his attitude. He quickly made that connection to, “Obama does that! We don’t have a king.”
RUSH: Wow, that was the exact idea. That was the objective, and at seven years old, he figured this out?
CALLER: Yes, sir. He did.
RUSH: You must be raising some really smart, aware kids.
CALLER: My wife and I, we’re trying to. They do say some things out in public like, “Oh, I like Ted Cruz,” as my wife and I do.
RUSH: There are college students who wouldn’t make that connection today, and your seven-year-old reads that and says, “Wow, Dad. This reminds me of Obama.” That’s exactly our goal.
CALLER: Yeah. His oldest brother a couple years ago, his teacher, won an essay contest you had going on. So she actually won a big bunch — 60 or so — of books for her school.
RUSH: Hang on. I’ve gotta take a break here, Isaac. Hang on through the break. It won’t be along. I need to ask you a couple of questions when we get back. This is amazing, folks.
BREAK TRANSCRIPT
RUSH: And we are back. We rejoin Isaac in Arizona City, Arizona, who’s describing an autistic son, one of his children, who magically is able to focus attention when he’s reading any of the Rush Revere Time-Travel Adventures with Exceptional Americans history books. Tell me again how old your autistic son is?
CALLER: He’s seven.
RUSH: He’s seven. And your daughter that you just described? I thought I heard you say she’s seven as well. They twins?
CALLER: No, I have three boys. Two of them are seven. They’re not twins. They’re very close in age. The youngest actually just turned seven, and he is about to turn eight —
RUSH: Okay.
CALLER: — at the beginning of April.
RUSH: Okay. Look, the reason I wanted you to hang on here is because I needed to ask, I would like to send you and the family one of these new iPad Pros, the 13-inch with an Apple pencil. I don’t know if your autistic son, does he draw, is he into art, and artistic things?
CALLER: Oh, yeah, if you put him down with something to draw or write or give him a puzzle
he’ll be occupied for a while.
RUSH: Let me tell you something, this iPad Pro and the iPad pencil he can draw to his heart’s content in any number of apps that are on it. The Notes app has a great sketch section on it. It’s a stock app that comes with it and it’s amazing. It is exactly like drawing on paper. It’ll blow him away. I mean, I really want to do this because it would be helpful, but it’s also some gratitude here, because this is an exceptional story, what you’ve told me here.
CALLER: Well, thank you very, very much. I’m very appreciative. A second ago he ran inside from the backyard and said, “Are you talking to Rush Revere?”
RUSH: (laughing).
CALLER: And I told him, “No, I’m talking to one of his friends.”
RUSH: Well, let me put you back with Mr. Snerdley, Isaac, and he’ll get your address, and we will ship it out. We’ll put some other stuff in there too. Gonna be two things. We’ll put together a package of stuff that we send also from the actual Rush Revere library. The iPad Pro will come separately. It will come in two different packages, the iPad Pro and the pencil and the keyboard will come together. He’ll eat it up. He’ll absolutely love this. You talk about focusing attention, ’cause I imagine he’s gonna just love the tech as much as what he can do with it. So I really appreciate it, Isaac. Thank you more than you know.