Actress Ann-Margret fell 22 feet from a stage scaffold at the Sahara Hotel in Lake Tahoe in 1972. She was in a coma for four days, having suffered a brain concussion. Several facial bones, her left arm, and her jaw were fractured. Expert plastic surgery miraculously repaired and restored her shattered face. After only two months, the determined 31-year-old actress-singer made a sensational comeback in Las Vegas.

Jack Palance (name at birth: Walter Palanuik), while serving in the U.S. Air Corps during World War II, was shot down. His plane went down in flames. While Palance survived, he received severe facial burns which required major plastic surgery. Years later, he made a name for himself as a supporting actor playing heavies in films.

When he was 20, Julio Iglesias was in a near-fatal auto accident when a runaway truck forced his car off the road. Paralyzed from the chest down, Iglesias's dream of becoming a soccer star was destroyed. At the time, he was a law student and an amateur soccer player. During long months of recovery, Iglesias worked incessantly at physical therapy. He'd been told that he would likely never walk again, but he wouldn't resign himself to the doctors' grim prognosis. A nurse gave him a guitar to keep him entertained, and he taught himself to play by imitating songs from the radio. While still paralyzed, Iglesias told his mother that he would become a singing star. Iglesias did overcome his paralysis. By 1994, Iglesias was an international star: he had more than 200 platinum and gold records under his belt, was grossing $50 million a year, and was ranked the top Hispanic entertainer in the United States.

Beatles drummer Ringo Starr was hospitalized at the Myrtle Street Children's Hospital in Liverpool for a burst appendix and peritonitis when he was 6 years old. He was in a coma for weeks and near death. Starr stayed in the hospital convalescing for 11 months.

In her late teens, Lucille Ball was in a horrific automobile accident. She spent eight months in a hospital and the next three years re-learning how to walk. Ball's show business aspirations to be a dancer had to be modified.

Author: Vicki McClure Davidson

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