What I learned from rereading The Wright Brothers by David McCullough.

At exactly 1035, Orville slipped the rope restraining the flyer and headed forward.

At the end of the track, the flyer lifted into the air and Daniels, who had never operated a camera until then, snapped the shutter to take what would become 1 of the most historic photographs of the century.

The course of the flight, in Orville's words, was extremely erratic.

The flyer rose, dipped down, rose again, bounced, and dipped again like a bucking bronco.

The total time airborne was approximately 12 seconds.

Scared, he said with a smile, there wasn't time.

It was only a flight of 12 seconds, he said, and it was an uncertain, wavy, creeping sort of flight at best, but it was a real flight at last.

a turn and went off like a bird for 175 feet.

Then on the fourth test, Wilbur flew through the air and a distance of 852 feet over the ground in 59 seconds.

They had endured violent storms, accidents, 1 disappointment after another, public indifference and ridicule, and clouds of demon mosquitoes.

To get to and from their remote sand dune testing ground, they had made 5 round trips from Ohio, a total of 7, 000 miles by train, all to fly a little more than half a mile.

What had transpired that day in 1903, in the stiff winds and cold of the outer banks, in less than 2 hours time, was 1 of the turning points in history.

The beginning of change for the world far greater than any of those present could possibly have imagined.

Being the kind of men they were, neither ever said the stunning contrast between their success and Samuel Langley's full-scale failure just days before.

Langley's project had cost nearly $70, 000, the greater part of it public money, whereas the Wright brothers' total expenses for everything from 1900 to 1903, including the materials and travel to and from Kitty Hawk, came to a little less than a thousand dollars.

A sum paid entirely from the modest profits of their bicycle business.

Of those who had been eyewitnesses, John T.

Daniels was the most effusive about what he had felt.

"'I like to think about that first airplane, he

air, as pretty as any bird you ever laid your eyes on.

And I don't think I ever saw a prettier sight in my life.

But it would have never happened, Daniel stressed, had it not been for the 2 workingest boys he ever met.

They put their whole heart and soul and all of their energy into an idea and they had faith.

That is an excerpt from the book that I just re-read and the 1 I'm gonna talk

to you about today, which is The Wright Brothers, and it was written by David McCullough.

I read this book for the first time 4 years ago and I actually did a podcast, it's Founders number 28 on it, and I wanted to re-read it because I think it's the single best illustration of this idea that I learned from Paul Graham.

He's also the founder of Y Combinator and his website is just fantastic because he's got all these great essays.

And I just want to read the first paragraph and the last paragraph.

Also leave it in the show notes in case you haven't read it.

And Paul has seen a ton of startup founders through his mentorship and his investment.

So I think that adds some weight onto his opinion, onto his words, what he's about to say here.

And he says, a couple of days ago, I finally got being a good startup founder down to 2

the last paragraph You can even use it tactically if I were running a startup This would be the phrase I taped to the mirror Make something people want is the destination, but be relentlessly resourceful is how you get there.

And that excerpt I just read to you is a great example of that.

The Wright brothers solved an ancient problem through their own work and research for less than a thousand dollars and they couldn't have done that unless they were relentlessly resourceful.

And 2 quick things before I jump back into the book.

If you want to buy a gift subscription for somebody else, that link is down below in the show notes on your podcast player.

It is also available at founderspodcast.com.

In the early days of Amazon, Jeff Bezos talked about the importance of having a shared base of knowledge with your coworkers.

And so Jeff and all the early executives at Amazon would actually read the same books.

And so Companies are also doing that with founders.

They're buying gift descriptions to founders for the founding team and the executives.

And that's 1 use case that I'm seeing pop up over and over again.

So I just want to bring it to your attention in case you wanted to do that for your company as well.

And the second thing real quick is a combination of an idea from Charlie Munger and Mark Andreessen.

Charlie Munger has this quote in the book, Damn Right, which I covered back on Founders number 221.

And he says, everybody engaged in complicated work needs colleagues.

Just the discipline of having to put your thoughts in order with somebody else is a very useful thing.

And then Mark Andreessen talks about the fact that he's read hundreds of biographies and he says what that allows him to do is to build little mental models and to stress test his own ideas.

So when he's presented with the decision, he'll say, OK, what would Elon Musk do in this situation?

What would Henry Ford do in this situation?

What would Steve Jobs do in this situation?

And I think a combination of those 2 ideas is very common thought that most founders have.

And I know this because a lot of founders get in touch with me and ask, Hey, is there a way I can talk to you to kind of balance this idea that I'm dealing with in my business off of what you have, what you've learned about the history of entrepreneurship.

And so I get more of these requests than I have time to accommodate.

If you're interested in organizing your thoughts or if you wanna stress test your ideas against what I've learned, there's a link down below, same thing.

It's in everything, all the links that I mentioned are in the show notes in your podcast player.

They're also available at FoundersPodcast.com.

The book starts with a fantastic quote, and there's a bunch of great one-liners in here, some of which I've never forgotten in the 4 years since I read it.

The very first page, it says, this is a quote by Wilbur Wright, and it says, No bird soars in a calm.

They come from the prologue and it says, according to the brothers Wilbur and Overwright, their fascination with flight began with them with a toy.

It was a small helicopter that was brought home by their father, Bishop Wright.

Their father was a great believer in the educational value of toys.

And so the 2 most important characters in the book are obviously Wilbur and Orville Wright.

I would say their father, and I'm gonna speak a lot more about him today, their father is the next most important character in the story.

He's somebody I greatly admire and you'll see why.

It says, now this is the second paragraph,

this is crazy, Orville's first grade teacher would remember him at his desk tinkering with bits of wood.

he was making a machine of a kind that he and his brother were gonna fly someday.

Okay, so I'm gonna get into the first chapter.

I want to talk about their personality traits.

Obviously I'm gonna talk about both Wright brothers today.

The 1 I admire the most, the 1 that I kept writing on the notes and in the margins of person that I want to copy a trait like they have trait he had

a trait that I want or I want to emulate is Wilbur so a lot of my um and he's kind of like the leader of the the 2 Wright brothers although they're both very very important but you're gonna hear me talk about him a lot today.

First, they talk about this photograph where it shows the entire family, their brothers, their sister, their dad, and it says, "...what was most uncharacteristic about the picture is that they, meaning Orville and Wilbur, sit doing nothing, something they almost never succumb to.

They were ever industrious and they were virtually inseparable.

They were also indispensable to each other.

They were brothers and partners in every single sense of the word.

They kept their money in a joint bank account.

That quote, they even thought together, was something that Wilbur said about him and his brother.

So again, going right into, if you saw the margins in this book.

Oh, so something I did, whenever I reread a book, sometimes I buy a new copy, sometimes I reread the copy that I had previously highlighted and annotated.

I don't have a rhyme or reason to this, but for this thing, for this this time around, I just decided to buy a fresh paperback copy.

And if you could see the paperback that I have

and over again, it's like, I want this trait.

I want to be that way over and over again.

And it says the brothers had tremendous energy working hard every day, but Sunday was a way of life.

And they were at their best and happiest working together on their own projects.

And then it's gonna get into how they worked.

This is the first mention of something that's repeated over and over again and something we've seen with Jeff Bezos, with Steve Jobs, Edwin Land.

There is, Ed Catmull, even the founder of Pixar said the same thing there there is a benefit to the conflict internal conflict can actually produce better results than just seeking internal harmony and I'll go into more detail later on but this

is the first example that not that things always went smoothly.

They could be highly demanding and critical of each other.

They could disagree to the point of shouting at times after an hour or more of heated argument.

They would find themselves as far from agreement as when they started.

Now, this is crazy except that each had changed to the others original position

and there's examples of the book of that They'll have a big argument overnight the next morning they come in and Usually they have they're working with other people like this guy Charlie Taylor who helped them with the engines of the the first airplane They'd walk in and say and Wilbur say you know what I've been thinking about it, Orville's right, let's do it his way.

A few minutes later, Orville would walk in and be like, you know, I was thinking about it, Wilbur's right, let's do it his way.

So that example is like, they'd start off in opposition and completely switch.

I double underline the sentence neither ever chose to be anything other than himself

In a number of ways they were unidentical twins Orville moved at a more more or less normal pace Wilbur was tremendously active of movement of movement walking always with a long rapid stride.

Wilbur was more serious by nature more studious and more reflective.

His memory of what he had seen and heard and so much of what he had read was astonishing.

Such were Wilbur's powers of concentration that to some he seemed a little strange.

He definitely lived inside of his own head.

This example of that, the strongest impression 1 gets of Wilbur Wright, said an old schoolmate, is of a man who lives largely in a world of his own.

Wilbur also had an unusual presence and remained imperturbable under almost any circumstance.

Never rattled, his father was proud to say.

He was an exceptional public speaker and lucid writer which seemed out of context for someone often so silent.

His remarks were articulate, to the point, and quite often memorable." And these just positive personality traits continues on the next page.

Wilbur was little bothered by what others might be thinking or saying.

They were always perfect gentlemen, naturally courteous to all.

They never drank hard liquor nor smoked or gambled.

What the 2 had in common above all was a unity of purpose and unyielding determination they had set themselves on a mission

and Then we get to the father his their father Bishop right who I mentioned earlier and the North left himself is the Wright brothers were blessed with a great great father it's almost like if you had like a Charlie Munger or like a Benjamin Franklin as your dad and he would just let it pepper you with little maxims and guides for life he does this throughout the book and a lot of things he says are pretty memorable so much so that they they quote him for years or at least Orville quotes him for years after he dies, because unfortunately Bishop Wright outlives Wilbur.

Wilbur dies of typhoid fever rather young at 45 years old.

So it says, from wide reading and observations of life He meaning Bishop Wright

the dad had acquired what seemed an inexhaustible supply of advice on behavior habits Of good and bad habits things to beware of in life and goals to strive for At home he preached courage and good character, finding a worthy purpose and perseverance."

So these are all things that they listen to the lessons and they kind of ran with it.

Providing guidelines he understood to be part of a father's duty." And then he says, "...make business first, pleasure afterward, and that guarded.

All the money anyone needs is just enough to prevent 1 from being a burden on others."

And he also set a fantastic example for the entire family because the entire family, everybody, read all the time.

A lot of the motivations to become obsessed with solving this problem of Howard Flight comes from a lot of the books they were reading.

So it says the brothers were well into their 20s before there was running water or plumbing in the house so they had to go there was an outhouse out back that's where they'd go to the bathroom and there was no electricity.

The Wright family book collection however, so it's talking about like they grew up in really like a modest in modest circumstances The father did not have a lot of money, but the little money he did have, he would spend on books.

And he says, the Wright family book collection, however, was neither modest nor commonplace.

Bishop Wright, a lifelong lover of books, heartily championed the limitless value of reading." That is a fantastic way to put reading.

Between formal education at school and informal education at home, it would seem that he would put more value on the latter.

He was never overly concerned about his children's attendance at school.

If 1 or the other of them thought chose to miss a day or 2 for some project or interest he thought worthy it was all right by him and certainly he ranked reading as worthy.

Wilbur read just about everything, but he had a particular love of history, and then the father would quote some lines from books, lines that stuck out as like little maxims for to guide them throughout life, which is absolutely fantastic.

similar to what you and I are doing with these books, right?

Let me think about a father telling his children this, and unfortunately, their mother dies rather young.

I forgot what kind of some kind of disease I don't think it was typhoid fever I can't remember exactly.

So it says every mind should be true to itself should think in investigate and conclude for itself That is a line that becomes extremely important because it's not like the Wright brothers were the only people attempting to solve this problem.

David McCullough, the author of this book, does a fantastic job of just kind of summarizing, you know, this is a problem that humans had fantasized about for thousands of years that had attempted to solve for thousands of years.

And so let me read that that line again, every mind should be true to itself, it should think investigate and conclude for itself what you and I would refer to as like shorthand is like we need to be capable of independent thinking something that obviously comes up a lot in this these stories that you and I go over and so the

no I left myself on that previous page was they were blessed with a great father they also knew that they were blessed blessed with a great father and it says years later a friend told oval that he and his brother would always stand as

an example of how far Americans with no special advantages could advance in

So what they're talking about is the fact that they didn't have a lot of money.

But Orville was like, yeah, but I had non-monetary benefits.

But this isn't true, Orville responded emphatically, to say that

The greatest thing in our favor was growing up in a family where there was always much encouragement to intellectual curiosity.

The encouragement to be independent thinkers and then to also that you can go out and you can do things for yourself.

They're resourceful and industrious from a very early age.

you, while they're still in high school, Orville started his own print shop in the carriage shed behind the house.

He designed and built his own printing press using a discarded tombstone, a buggy spring, and scrap metal.

With the help of Wilbur, he began publishing a newspaper called the West Side News, which is devoted to the going to the going on and interest of their part of Dayton Ohio

so they make a little money from selling ads they

were just talk about the news in their little town this is by now and then the brothers would include items from other publications that they judged worthy of their readers attention and so this is a quote they read this they liked it so they put in his 2 paragraphs they wanted the readers to know.

Do not wait for the boy to grow up before you begin to treat him as an equal.

A proper amount of confidence and words of encouragement and advice.

This sounds like exactly what their father did to them.

Give him to understand that you trust him in many ways.

It helps to make a man of him long before he is a man in either stature or years.

finds he can make a few articles with his hands.

And so, they're writing this around the late 1800s, early 1900s.

Claude Hopkins, I did the podcast on him that probably history's greatest copywriter, I think it was like Founders Number 170.

It's not what you and I think of articles, it's not written, it's talking about, really you

can substitute for products, making something.

So it says, if a boy can find he can make a few products with his hands, it tends to make him rely on himself.

And the planning that is necessary for the execution of the work is a discipline and an education of great value to him.

So that sounds exactly what, essentially they're giving advice, they're reprinting advice, it sounds what their father did for them.

With the paper showing some profit, Orville moved the business to a rented space and Wilbur, who is now 22, was prominently listed as the editor.

Their second business is going to come from the fact that at this point in history the bicycle was taking over.

It was an absolute phenomenon and it spread like wildfire.

Bicycles had become the sensation of the time.

You can kind of think about this as like the internet in our day.

The bicycle was proclaimed to be a boon to all mankind, a thing of beauty, good for the spirits, good for health and vitality, and indeed one's whole outlook on life.

And it just goes into more detail just how how how went from essentially like 0 to a hundred in no time And so the Wright brothers spot an opportunity like okay, we're gonna we can manufacture it like they can build anything They're extremely resourceful says in the spring of 1893 Wilbur and Orville opened their own small bicycle business the Wright cycle exchange They called it And they started selling and repairing bicycles.

And I'm not sure why, but now obviously I've read, what, 230 books since the last time I read this book.

And there's something about that paragraph that made me think of what Bill Gates said.

It's the sequel to Bill Gates' biography called Hard Drive.

And in Overdrive, it talks about how Bill Gates kind of missed the internet.

And so I just want to read 1 paragraph from that book, Overdrive.

It says, Finally, the Internet had the attention of the man in charge of the biggest and most powerful software company on the planet.

Microsoft still had not started to develop a business and technical strategy for responding to this phenomenon.

It would be more than a year before Gates fully acknowledged the importance of the internet and decreed all of Microsoft's considerable brain and firepower be directed at the most serious challenge the company had ever faced.

So he was slow to the realization but once he realized it he put all the force and essentially turned Microsoft on a dime.

He says something in that book later on though that really is the main point of why I read that is that you can never fight against a phenomenon as powerful as something like the bicycle craze and the rights day or the internet and our day.

That you have to use, don't fight against it, that you should use it to your benefit.

So they open up their business, they start doing well, but that attracts a lot of attention.

A lot of other people start building bicycle shops so they have a lot more competition that's going to draw down, lower their profits obviously.

And this is where we see that Wilbur has this tendency in his life to kind of take a pause and be like, hey, I'm not actually sure I'm on the right track here.

And it says, business remained good, but with the opening of more bicycle shops in town, competition kept growing.

When sales grew slack, Wilbur turned conspicuously restless, uncertain of what to make of his life he had long thought he'd like to be

a teacher which he which he thought was an honorable pursuit he had no knack for business he decided now this is hilarious that he says this remembers later on because they also references after they've invented and they're starting to sell airplanes, he's actually having to learn how to be an entrepreneur at the highest levels on the fly.

And they reference this, what he's about to say here, how he previously doubted that he could actually even, like he's not, he's like, I don't have any business skills.

He just didn't know so, that he didn't know he had those skills he had no knack for business he decided he felt ill suited for it now he says I do not think I am fitted for success in any commercial pursuit I might make a living but I doubt whether I would ever do much more than that.

And so he writes this long letter, basically putting down his thoughts on what it would take to be successful in business.

In business it is the aggressive man who continually has his eye on

No man has ever been successful in business who was not aggressive, self-assertive, and even a little bit selfish perhaps.

There's nothing reprehensible in an aggressive disposition so long as it is not carried to excess.

For such men make the world and its affairs move.

We have done reasonably well, better in fact than the average man perhaps, but not 1 of us has yet made particular use of the talent in which he excels other men.

That is why our success has only been moderate." so that's actually really wise that he actually put this.

We've done better than average, but we haven't lived up to our full potential and full capability because we haven't picked a market.

We haven't picked an endeavor which actually makes use of our particular talent, the talent that we possess greater than every other person.

He's not doing that in the bicycle business.

They do do that in the airplane business or the creation of the airplane business is another way to think about it.

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#239 The Wright Brothers