Founders
Episode 28 #28 The Wright Brothers
Founders

Episode 28: #28 The Wright Brothers

Founders

Episode 28

#28 The Wright Brothers

David Senra is the host of Founders, where he studies history's greatest entrepreneurs. This is what he learned from reading The Wright Brothers by David McCullough

What I learned from reading The Wright Brothers by David McCullough

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Unyielding determination (2:30) 

Jocko's concept of GOOD (4:00)

The ability to focus on an idea for a long time is the antidote to short bursts of dopamine we get from checking social feeds all day. (6:30)

The beginning of their side business (13:00)

The importance of heroes (16:00)

Rereading / revisiting old ideas (18:30)

Books transformed idle curiosity into the active zeal of workers (22:00)

Wilbur Wright on risk: “The man who wishes to keep at the problem long enough to really learn anything positively must not take dangerous risks. Carelessness and overconfidence are usually more dangerous than deliberately accepted risks.” (24:30)

Jeff Bezos on stress (25:00)

Discover things for yourself (28:00)

"Success it most certainly was." (31:00)

Profitability of flying machines (33:30)

The distribution channel of flying machines (35:00) 

Wilbur Wright on the idea of flight: "In the enthusiasm being shown around me, I see not merely an outburst intended to glorify a person, but a tribute to an idea that has always impassioned mankind. I sometimes think that the desire to fly after the fashion of birds is an ideal handed down to us by our ancestors who, in their grueling travels across trackless lands in prehistoric times, looked enviously on the birds soaring freely through space, at full speed, above all obstacles, on the infinite highway of the air." (38:00)

#28 The Wright Brothers

Introduction

"Orville's first teacher in grade school would remember him at his desk tinkering with bits of wood. Asked what he was up to, he told her he was making a machine of a kind that he and his brother were going to fly someday."

I'm David Senra, and you're listening to Founders, my podcast about the biographies of founders. I got the idea for this podcast from listening to another podcast years ago. Elon Musk was being interviewed and said something that stuck with me. He was asked, "When starting a company, who did you look to for advice?" Elon said he looked for feedback in a historical context, books basically. He continued, "I didn't read many general business books. I liked biographies and autobiographies. I think those are pretty helpful." So that made me think, if Elon found biographies useful, why not start reading them all the time. Then I decided to share what I learned from reading these books and create this podcast. So with that said, I'm going to tell you some of the ideas I learned from reading The Wright Brothers by David McCullough.

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