Norman Keith Collins (Sailor Jerry)
Norman Keith Collins was born in Reno, Nevada, on January 14, 1911. He grew up in Northern California, though. As a child, he rode freight trains across the country and learned how to tattoo from a man named “Big Mike” from Palmer, Alaska. At first, “Big Mike” taught him how to tattoo by hand-pricking. At the end of the 1920s, he met a man from Chicago named Tatts Thomas, who taught him how to use a tattoo machine. He got drunk people from Skid Row to help him learn. After that, he sailed across the Pacific Ocean and moved to Hawaii in the 1930s.
Collins joined the US Navy when he was 19 years old. During his next journeys at sea, he saw the art and images of Southeast Asia. During his time as a tattoo artist, he was also a licensed skipper of a large three-masted schooner, on which he gave tours of the Hawaiian islands. He not only sailed and got tattoos, but he also played the saxophone in his own dance band and was known as “Old Ironsides” on his own radio show.
Sailor Jerry made important changes to the way tattoos are done. By making his own pigments, he made it possible to use more colors. He made custom needle patterns that put pigment into the skin with much less damage. He was one of the first artists to use needles that could only be used once. One of the first places to use an autoclave to clean equipment was his tattoo shop.
Collin’s last shop was at 1033 Smith Street in Honolulu’s Chinatown, which at the time was the only place on the island with tattoo shops. Most people agree that Sailor Jerry changed the way tattooing is done today. Sailor Jerry wanted at least one of his three apprentices/friends, Ed Hardy, Mike Malone, or Zeke Owen, to run his shop after he died (or burn it down).
Since 2015, an event called the “Sailor Jerry Festival” has been held every June in Hawaii to honor Collins and his Chinatown roots on the island of Oahu. Live music, DJs, cabaret performances, an art show with artists like Sailor Jerry’s great-grandniece Madison Thomas, local artists, and Masami Teraoka, movie screenings, a pin-up fashion show where models wear outfits made from Sailor Jerry flash, neighborhood tours, and tattoos at three shops in the area, including Sailor Jerry’s last location. The founder of the festival gives some of the money from the event to the Collins family every year.
Gandhi and Mandela
Mahatma Gandhi was born in India when it was ruled by the British. He was a lawyer, politician, and activist, and many people consider him to be the father of India because of how he led the country. Gandhi is known all over the world for his support of peaceful protest.
Nelson Mandela was born thousands of miles away in a different century. He fought against white rule in South Africa for decades while in prison. In 1994, Mandela became the first President of South Africa to be chosen through a democratic process.
Mandela says that Gandhi had an effect on him as a leader, even though they never met. Gandhi, on the other hand, wrote a lot and had a big impact on many people through his writing. Mandela said at a conference in 2013: “In a world driven by violence and strife, Gandhi’s message of peace and non-violence holds the key to human survival in the 21st century.”
