I think he was a bum that pretended to be a cripple that made it big after two fat cats bet a million dollars on whether or not they could make him a successful broker.
No, no, bmfpv was a student there when he dropped his only copy of his thesis down a steam vent and into a boiler room where it was recovered by a homeless man who made a deal with bmfpv that, for every day's accommodation and food, he would return a page of the thesis. Despite their rocky start, the two quickly became friends. Sadly, the homeless man had asbestosis from his days building ships for the Merchant Marines, and he died just before bmfpv's graduation. But, in their short time together, bmfpv learned a lot about education, misjudgment, life, love, and friendship.