Four-year-old Anthony Smith has started to wear his hearing aid after his mother worked with Marvel Comics this summer to convince him that superheroes sometimes wore hearing aids too. Anthony's mother contacted Marvel asking the publishers knew of a superhero who wore a hearing aid. The comic book giant responded straight away with a character called Hawkeye and his hearing aid-wearing sidekick Blue Ear. The comic book company also produced a cover poster of Blue Ear especially for Anthony, using full colour printing. Anthony's father, Kevin, commented on this, saying:
“They sent us a picture of Hawkeye wearing a hearing aid, plus a newly designed cover featuring The Blue Ear – a superhero created just for Anthony."
Bill Roseman, writer and editor at Marvel Comics, spoke about the work that went into convincing Anthony to wear his hearing aid. Roseman said:
“The e-mail from Anthony’s mother got me thinking. Maybe we could create a superhero that would make him feel good about wearing his hearing aid.”
Another of the editors at Marvel, Thomas Brennan, said:
“Our job is to make sure that kids like Anthony believe in heroes – and we’ll do that job.”
Anthony is now proudly wearing his hearing aid, just like Blue Ear, while his mother, Christine, said that Anthony is bravely dealing with the issues he has had with his hearing.