Founders

What I learned from reading Bowerman and the Men of Oregon: The Story of Oregon's Legendary Coach and Nike's Cofounder by Kenny Moore.  ---- [0:01] Take a primitive organism, any weak, pitiful organism. Say a freshman. Make it lift, or jump or run. Let it rest. What happens? A little miracle. It gets a little better. It gets a little stronger or faster or more enduring. That's all training is. Stress. Recover. Improve. You would think any damn fool could do it, but you won't. [0:25] You work too hard and you rest too little and get hurt.  [1:38] You cannot just tell somebody what’s good for him. He won’t listen. He will not listen. First, you have to get his attention.   [4:14] From the book Shoe Dog. Phil Knight on Bowerman: I look back over the decades and see him toiling in his workshop, Mrs. Bowerman carefully helping, and I get goosebumps. He was Edison in Menlo Park, Da Vinci in Florence, Tesla in Wardenclyffe. Divinely inspired. I wonder if he knew, if he had any clue, that he was the Daedalus of sneak

What I learned from reading Personal History by Katherine Graham.  ---- [1:02] A few minutes later there was the ear-splitting noise of a gun going off indoors. I bolted out of the room and ran around in a frenzy looking for him. When I opened the door to a downstairs bathroom, I found him. It was so profoundly shocking and traumatizing —he was so obviously dead.  [3:56] Katherine Graham was the first-ever female CEO of a fortune 500 company.  [5:30] This book is the inner monologue of someone not at all comfortable with herself and where she fits in with others.  [8:55] Katherine's mom on having a second wind: The fatigue of the climb was great but it is interesting to learn once more how much further one can go on one’s second wind. I think that is an important lesson for everyone to learn for it should also be applied to one’s mental efforts. Most people go through life without ever discovering the existence of that whole field of endeavor which we describe as second wind. Whether mentally or physically oc

What I learned from reading Overnight Success: Federal Express and Frederick Smith, Its Renegade Creator by Vance Trimble. ---- [0:01] At age thirty Frederick Wallace Smith was in deep trouble. His dream of creating Federal Express had become too expensive and was fast fizzling out. He had exhausted his father’s millions. He was in hock for 15 or 20 million more. He appeared in danger of losing his cargo jets and also his wife. His own board of directors had fired him as CEO. Now the FBI accused him of forging papers to get a $2 million bank loan and was trying to send him to prison. He thought of suicide.  [1:08] At any risk, at any cost, he refused to let his Federal Express dream die.  [6:23] I believe that a man who expects to win out in business without self-denial and self-improvement stands about as much chance as a prizefighter would stand if he started a hard ring battle without having gone through intensive training. Natural ability, even when accompanied by the spirit to win, is never sufficient. 

What I learned from reading Sam Walton: The Inside Story of America's Richest Man by Vance H. Trimble. ---- [3:11] Charlie Munger on Sam Walton: It's quite interesting to think about Walmart starting from a single store in Arkansas – against Sears Roebuck with its name, reputation and all of its billions. How does a guy in Bentonville, Arkansas, with no money, blow right by Sears, Roebuck? And he does it in his own lifetime – in fact, during his own late lifetime because he was already pretty old by the time he started out with one little store. He played the chain store game harder and better than anyone else. Walton invented practically nothing. But he copied everything anybody else ever did that was smart – and he did it with more fanaticism. So he just blew right by them all.  [4:46]  Sam Walton was no ordinary man. He was a genius in business, with an iron mind —some say pig-headed—unwilling to compromise any of his carefully thought out policies and principles.  [5:08] To him, making money was only a ga

What I learned from reading The Big Rich: The Rise and Fall of the Greatest Texas Oil Fortunes by Bryan Burrough. ---- [3:12] There's truth behind legend. There really were poor Texas boys who discovered gushing oil wells and became overnight billionaires, patriarchs of squabbling families who owned private islands and colossal mansions and championship football teams, who slept with movie stars and jousted with presidents and tried to corner and international market or two.  [9:55] Their success raised a tantalizing question. What if there really was another Spindletop out there, and what if it were discovered not by a large company but by a single Texan working alone? One well, one fortune, it was the stuff of myth, the Eldorado of Texas Oil, and as a new decade dawned, a hoard of young second-generation oilmen would begin trying to find it.  [14:53] He first headed to the Houston public library where he read every book he could find on the geology of oil.  [17:51] Let me get a shave and a bath. Tomorrow's

What I learned from Random Reminiscences of Men and Events by John D. Rockefeller.  ---- [0:16] These incidents which come to my mind to speak of seemed vitally important to me when they happened, and they still stand out distinctly in my memory.  [2:43] That sounds funny, making friends among the eminent dead, but if you go through life making friends with the eminent dead who had the right ideas, I think it will work better in life and work better in education. — Charlie Munger  [3:07] On Founders #16 I covered the biography of Rockefeller. Titan: The Life of John D. Rockefeller.  [3:19] Rockefeller prioritized silence and using the element of surprise by not telling people what he was up to.  [3:54] The book I read for Founders #31 Conspiracy: Peter Thiel, Hulk Hogan, Gawker, and the Anatomy of Intrigue by Ryan Holiday.  [5:02] They woke up and saw for the first time that my mind had not been idle while they were talking so big and loud.  [5:35] He's attempting to buy out one of his competitors and he says

What I learned from reading Revolver: Sam Colt and the Six-Shooter That Changed America by Jim Rasenberger. ---- [0:01] Sam Colt embodied the America of his time. He was big brash, voracious, imaginative, and possessed extraordinary drive and energy. He was a classic disruptor who not only invented a world-changing product but produced it and sold it in world-changing ways.  [1:59] He had solved one of the great technological challenges of the early 19th century.  [2:36] He was rich at 21. Poor at 31. Then rich again at 41.  [7:10] Sam Colt solved a 400-year-old problem. The guns of 1830 were essentially what they had been in 1430. [7:53] There's a financial panic in 1819. This is a very important part in the life of Sam Colt. It may explain why he was such a hard worker, ruthless, and determined. The panic of 1819 bankrupts his family.  [10:48] What kind of person would do this voluntarily? He was set to embark on a 17,000-mile voyage across the Atlantic, around the horn of Africa, through the Indian ocean a

What I learned from reading Hershey: Milton S. Hershey's Extraordinary Life of Wealth, Empire, and Utopian Dreams by Michael D'Antonio. ---- [0:01] Perhaps the only thing about Milton Hershey that is absolutely certain is that he believed in progress. He was always moving.  [2:51] This blew my mind. Only six universities held larger endowments. Which meant that the Milton Hershey School was richer than Cornell, Columbia, or the University of Pennsylvania.    [4:14] Milton’s father was unrealized ambition personified.   [5:44] One of the biggest things Milton learned from his father and something he avoided. His father had 1,000 schemes and never stuck to any of them. He didn’t know what perseverance meant.  [7:25] Rockefeller had arrived in Oil City in the same year as Hershey, 1860. But unlike Henry, he was possessed of extraordinary energy, remarkable financial savvy, and an uncanny ability to remain focused on his goals.  [8:00] Henry’s had a preference for talking about things rather than doing them. Even

What I learned from reading The Chief: The Life of William Randolph Hearst by David Nasaw. ---- [0:20] There has never been —nor, most likely, will there ever again be — a publisher like William Randolph Hearst.  [0:26] Decades before synergy became a corporate cliche, Hearst put the concept into practice. His magazine editors were directed to buy only stories which could be rewritten into screenplays to be produced by his film studio and serialized, reviewed, and publicized in his newspapers and magazines. He broadcast the news from his papers over the radio and pictured it in his newsreels.  [1:42]  Winston Churchill on William Randolph Hearst: “Hearst was most interesting to meet,” Churchill wrote. “I got to like him — a grave, simple child — with no doubt a nasty temper — playing with the most costly toys. A vast income always over spent: ceaseless building and collecting . . .two magnificent establishments, two charming wives; complete indifference to public opinion, a 15 million daily circulation, and e

What I learned from reading Endurance: Shackleton's Incredible Voyage by Alfred Lansing. ---- [0:58] All the men were struck, almost to the point of horror, by the way the ship behaved like a giant beast in its death agonies.  [1:27]  His name was Sir Ernest Shackleton, and the twenty-seven men he had watched so ingloriously leaving the stricken ship were the members of his Imperial Trans-Antarctic Expedition.  [2:02] Few men have borne the responsibility Shackleton did at that moment. Though he certainly was aware that their situation was desperate, he could not possibly have imagined then the physical and emotional demands that ultimately would be placed upon them, the rigors they would have to endure, the sufferings to which they would be subjected.  [2:52] Their plight was naked and terrifying in its simplicity: If they were to get out—they had to get themselves out.  [9:21] Shackleton returned to England a hero of the Empire. He was lionized wherever he went, knighted by the king, and decorated by every

What I learned from reading Tuxedo Park : A Wall Street Tycoon and the Secret Palace of Science That Changed the Course of World War II by James Conant. ---- [0:01] Few men of Loomis’ prominence and achievement have gone to greater lengths to foil history.  [0:17]  Independently wealthy, iconoclastic, and aloof, Loomis did not conform to the conventional measure of a great scientist. He was too complex to categorize—financier, philanthropist, society figure, physicist, inventor, dilettante—a contradiction in terms.  [0:42] He rose to become one of the most powerful figures in banking in the 1920s.  [4:42] The smile was a velvet glove covering his iron determination to get underway without any lost motion.  [5:29] He would dedicate himself to overcoming Germany’s scientific advantage.  [7:19] He had amassed a substantial fortune, which allowed him to act as a patron.  [8:06] Loomis was a bit stiff, with the bearing of a four-star general in civilian clothes. He was strong and decisive.   [10:15]  He was enthus

What I learned from reading The Hour of Fate: Theodore Roosevelt, J.P. Morgan, and the Battle to Transform American Capitalism by Susan Berfield.  ---- [0:17] Morgan was the most influential of these businessmen. He wasn’t the richest but that didn’t matter; he was commanding in a way none could match.  [0:38] Morgan had an aristocrat’s disdain for public sentiment and the conviction that his actions were to the country’s advantage, no explanations necessary.  [0:50] Roosevelt thought big business was not only inevitable but essential. He also believed it had to be accountable to the public, and Roosevelt considered himself the public.  [1:04] Each [Morgan and Roosevelt] presumed he could use his authority to determine the nation’s course. Each expected deference from the other along the way. [2:18] “I’m afraid of Mr. Roosevelt because I don’t know what he’ll do,” Morgan said. “He’s afraid of me because he does know what I’ll do,” Roosevelt replied.  [5:24] Morgan had trusted his father to set him on the righ

What I learned from reading Total Recall: My Unbelievably True Life Story by Arnold Schwarzenegger. ---- I decided that the best course for independence was to mind my own business and make my own money.I never felt that I was good enough, strong enough, smart enough. He let me know that there was always room for improvement. A lot of sons would have been crippled by his demands, but instead, the discipline rubbed off on me. I turned it into drive.I became absolutely convinced that I was special and meant for bigger things. I knew I would be the best at something - although I didn’t know what - and that it would make me famous. I never went to a competition to compete. I went to win. Even though I didn’t win every time, that was my mindset. I became a total animal. If you tuned into my thoughts before a competition, you would hear something like: “I deserve that pedestal, I own it, and the sea ought to part for me. Just get out of the fucking way, I’m on a mission. So just step aside and gimme the trophy.” I

What I learned from reading Hard Drive: Bill Gates and the Making of the Microsoft Empire by James Wallace and Jim Erickson.  ---- Microsoft had become the first software company to sell more than a billion dollars worth of software in a single year. Gates was the undisputed mastermind of that success, a brilliant technocrat, ruthless salesman, and manipulative businessman. Gates had slammed his fist into his palm and vowed to put several of his major software competitors out of business. By 1991, many of those competitors were in full retreat. I can do anything I put my mind to. Aggressive and stimulated by conflict; prone to change mood quickly; a dominating personality with outstanding powers of leadership. Mary Gates, in describing her son, has said that he has pretty much done what he wanted since the age of eight. Even as a child Gates had an obsessive personality and a compulsive need to be the best. Everything Bill did, he did to the max. Everything he did, he did competitively and not simply to relax

What I learned from reading The House of Morgan: An American Banking Dynasty and the Rise of Modern Finance by Ron Chernow.  [0:01] This book is about the rise, fall, and resurrection of an American banking empire—the House of Morgan.  [1:56] What gave the House of Morgan its tantalizing mystery was its government links. Much like the Rothschilds it seemed insinuated into the power structure of many countries, especially the United States.  [2:46] They practiced a brand of banking that has little resemblance to standard retail banking.  [3:43] They have weathered wars and depressions, scandals and hearings, bomb blasts and attempted assassinations.  [4:44] Contrary to the usual law of perspective, the Morgans seem to grow larger as they recede in time.  [5:41] I was struck that the old Wall Street—elite, clubby, and dominated by small, mysterious partnerships—bore scant resemblance to the universe of faceless conglomerates springing up across the globe.  [6:49] Only one firm, one family, one name rather glori

What I learned from reading Reluctant Genius: The Passionate Life and Inventive Mind of Alexander Graham Bell by Charlotte Gray. ---- [0:01]  I have my periods of restlessness when my brain is crowded with ideas tingling to my fingertips when I am excited and cannot stop for anybody. Let me alone, let me work as I like even if I have to sit up all night all night or even for two nights. When you see me flagging, getting tired, discouraged put your hands over my eyes so that I go to sleep and let me sleep as long as I like until I wake. Then I may hand around, read novels and be stupid without an idea in my head until I get rested and ready for another period of work. But oh, do not do as you often do, stop me in the midst of my work, my excitement with “Alex, Alex, aren’t you coming to bed? It’s one o’clock, do come.” Then I have to come feeling cross and ugly. Then you put your hands on my eyes and after a while I go to sleep, but the ideas are gone, the work is never done.  [1:20]  Books are the original li

What I learned from reading Barnum: An American Life by Robert Wilson.  ---- [1:23] He is known today primarily for his connection to the circus, but that came only in the last quarter of his long life. Less well known is that he was also a best-selling author, an inspirational lecturer on temperance and on success in business, a real-estate developer, a builder, a banker, a state legislator, and the mayor of Bridgeport, Connecticut.  [1:54] In all endeavors he was a promoter and self-promotor without peer, a relentless advertiser and an unfailingly imaginative concoctor of events to draw the interest of potential patrons.   [3:16] Through hard work, a lot of brass, and a genius for exploiting new technologies related to communication and transportation, he became world famous and wealthy beyond his dreams.  [3:54] He led a rich, event-filled, exhilarating life, one indeed characterized by both struggles and triumphs. His life is well worth knowing.   [5:36] Barnum’s was 16 when his father died, leaving his f

What I learned from reading A Success Story by Estee Lauder. ---- You can probably reach out with comparative ease and touch a life of serenity and peace. You can wait for things to happen and not get too sad when they don’t. That’s fine for some but not for me. Serenity is pleasant, but it lacks the ecstasy of achievement. [0:10] I’ve always believed that if you stick to a thought and carefully avoid distraction along the way, you can fulfill a dream. I kept my eye on the target. I never allowed my eye to leave the target. I always believed that success comes from not letting your eyes stray from that target.  [1:10] Beauty is an ancient industry: Women have always enhanced their looks. It has always been so. It will always be so. [4:18]  Lessons from here mother: The secret is to imagine yourself as the most important person in the room. Imagine it vividly enough and you will become that person. [6:01]  You could make a thing wonderful by enhancing its outward appearance. Little did I know I’d be doing the

What I learned from reading Pulitzer: A Life in Politics, Print, and Power by James McGrath Morris. ---- [0:20]  Joseph Pulitzer was the midwife to the birth of the modern mass media. Pulitzer’s lasting achievement was to transform American journalism into a medium of mass consumption and immense influence.  [3:04] He was the pioneer of the modern media industry.   [5:06] Teddy Roosevelt tried to have Joseph Pulitzer put in jail.   [7:11] How one of Pulitzer’s adult sons viewed him: One of the strange differences between us two is the fact that you have never come near learning how to enjoy life.  [9:42] Joseph favored reading works of history and biography.   [10:12] Joseph understood fully the extent of the calamity [his father’s death]. He had been 9 years old when his older brother died, 10 when his younger brother and sister died, 11 when his father died, and 13 at the death of his last sister.  [11:50] At 17 years old Joseph escapes to America. A group of wealthy Boston businessmen recruit thousands of

What I learned from reading A Triumph of Genius: Edwin Land, Polaroid, and the Kodak Patent War by Ronald Fierstein.  ---- [0:21] He died in 1991 with 535 patents to his credit, third in U.S. history. His honorary doctorate degrees, too numerous to list, come from the most distinguished academic institutions, including Harvard, Yale, and Columbia. He received virtually every distinction the scientific community has to offer, including the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the National Medal of Science, the National Inventors Hall of Fame, and membership in the prestigious Royal Society of London. Land was included on Life’s list of the 100 most important Americans of the twentieth century.   [1:35]  In so many ways, on so many occasions, Land’s life was a manifestation of the indefatigable can-do attitude he embraced and encouraged others to follow.  [2:15] Land has the well-grounded suspicion that good, careful, systematic planning can kill a creative company.   [2:34] Pick problems that are important and nearl