WHAT is a hero? In literary epics such as "Gilgamesh," the "Illiad," or "Beowulf," heroes are those who defy pain and death to live out a personal code of unqualified honor. In economists' parlance, heroes risk significant personal costs to help others. Heroism continues today, though it is, as always, in short supply.

The familiar hero jumps into an icy river to save a drowning child. Such isolated, impulsive acts are dramatic and admirable, but are not the most important kind of heroism. The more important involves standing against the tide of opinion to do what is right. Such people may resist the power of an abusive government or cultural norms that harm the less fortunate or the environment. Two heroes in this tradition are Arthur Temple and Harry Teasley.

Arthur Temple Jr. was born in l920, and for 26 years ran the Temple family's extensive timber empire in east Texas. In l973, he merged Temple Industries with the much larger and highly diversified Time Inc., becoming a major shareholder in Time. Arthur Temple was an entrepreneur who transformed Temple Industries into a major forest products company.

But Temple's heroism is only tangentially related to his business success. For many years, Temple's formative years, rural people in southeast Texas attached little importance to environmental values. Since wildlife habitat had no immediate dollar value, it was ignored by the east Texas forest industry. Forest-dependent wildlife were open-access, common-pool resources. With no one to protect them, entire species were decimated by poor forestry and poaching.

Temple stood against these pressures for years to enforce stewardship on his lands. His conservation efforts affronted the dominant culture. Arson and threats of violence were commonplace. But Temple persisted and today Temple Inland remains a national leader in supporting and applying wildlife research.

Temple is also a civil-rights hero. Six years before "Brown v. Board of Education," he led the integration of schools in his company's town of Diboll, Texas. In the mid-1960s, a group of civil-rights activists was traveling through the South, going into segregated restaurants and staging sit-ins if they were refused service. Temple Industries had built a cafe in Diboll, the Pine Bough, to provide company visitors and residents with a quality restaurant.

The manager called Arthur Temple, then company president, saying these activists would soon test the Pine Bough - what should he do? "Serve 'em" replied Temple. Then, realizing this might be difficult for the manager, Temple said he could work the cash register and his wife could wait tables. Temple led by example to overcome the prejudices of his time. With such leadership, the regular staff handled the situation.

Our other hero is Harry E. Teasley Jr., CEO of the Coca-Cola Nestle joint enterprise headquartered in Tampa, Fla. Teasley vigorously opposed the construction of a taxpayer-subsidized hotel intended to boost business for Tampa's money-losing, city-owned convention center.

Teasley had a principled opposition to this misadventure in civic socialism. He spent $15,000 of his own money on a public opinion survey. The survey, done by a professional polling firm, showed 90 percent of Tampa's voters wanted a referendum on the hotel's bonds. Two-thirds of registered voters opposed publicly subsidized funding. Teasley then purchased an ad in the Tampa Tribune Times explaining the economic and ethical problems with the hotel. Teasley had no financial interest in the hotel or convention business. He was simply a public-spirited citizen with the means, the character, and the intelligence to promote good public policy.

Like Arthur Temple, Harry Teasley took the hero's stance. In doing so, he demonstrates the difference between being pro-business and pro-free market. There was strong business support for the hotel - the Greater Tampa Chamber of Commerce and Tampa Downtown Partnership urged the City Council's support. Before Teasley, there was only weak opposition because people of substance wouldn't take a public position.

Like Dr. Stockman in Henrik Ibsen's "Enemy of the People," Teasley stood up and told the truth. Defying the business community, he kept standing and telling the truth. Unlike Dr. Stockman, Teasley won.

Teasley offered a pro-free market position with strong theoretical and ethical legitimacy: Government should not subsidize services that are provided by the market. Since wealth and political power go together, such subsidies become socialism for the well-off. Tampa's convention center was an economic loser, and the hotel could not rescue it. As Ludwig von Mises noted: "Government intervention always breeds economic dislocations that necessitate more Government intervention."

Heroes such as Arthur Temple and Harry Teasley are important to all societies; their behavior exemplifies values we want people to emulate. They defy prevailing opinion, be it racial prejudice, faith in socialism, or poaching. Heroes are role models who make it easier for the less-courageous to act justly. At a time when there is widespread cynicism toward those active in public affairs, we should recognize and honor our heroes. We are going to need more of them.