Through the ages, hundreds of engineers died trying to invent a machine that would fly. Orville and Wilbur Wright succeeded. However, the highest aspiration they had for their machine was that it would become a recreational vehicle.
When I read that piece of information, I was astonished.
The contemporary scientists of the Wrights’ day were in agreement. In the first decade of the twentieth century, American Scientific Magazine disparaged the idea that the airplane could impact everyday life. Shortly thereafter, the United States began to trail other countries in the airplane industry—such as it was in that day.
The Wright brothers never saw the implications of their flying machine. Their imaginations failed to help them understand how their aircraft could be used in business and military. Consequently, you have never flown on a “Wright” airplane. But if you have flown on an airplane, quite possibly, you have flown on a Boeing.
In the year 1910, William Boeing lived in Seattle, Washington. In that age, he was isolated, both geographically and metaphorically, from the primary locations of aeronautical research along the East Coast.
Boeing did not know how to build an airplane. Boeing did not know how to fly an airplane; he had little technical knowledge concerning aeronautical engineering. However, he had the one vital element that was missing from practically any other human being in the Western Hemisphere–he had a vision; Boeing understood and could visualize the potential of the airplane.
Boeing could see in his imagination that airplanes could become commercially successful in the transportation of passengers and goods. His problem was that technology had not yet caught up to his vision.
Boeing did not just stand around and wait. He invested virtually all of his resources seeking to create the technology that would put his vision into place. He moved to form a company that would find success in this new field of aeronautical transportation.
Boeing encountered obstacle after obstacle. One of the first arrived when the United States entered into World War I in 1917. This would be the first war in which airplanes would participate.
The U.S. military was looking for planes. Boeing had a new design that he envisioned the U.S. military using, but he had to confront the fact that the military was testing new planes in the state of Florida. That was over 3000 miles away from Boeing's project site in Washington State.
The distance was too prohibitive for flying Boeing’s tiny planes. So his team took the planes apart, packed the parts in boxes, and shipped them across the country. They were put back together in Florida, tested, and later used by the military.
Technology and income opportunities slowed development in the aeronautics field. Boeing made do by using his airplane factory to make boats and furniture. Nevertheless, he stuck to his long-range plan.
Seventeen years after Boeing first dreamed of airplanes, Charles Lindbergh made his historic flight from New York to Paris. Finally, the airline industry saw a boom. Boeing was ready, and he dominated the industry.
William Boeing—a man who initially knew nothing about flying or making airplanes—changed the world because he had a vision.
Behold the power of vision.
Source: How Life Imitates Chess: Making the Right Moves, from the Board to the Boardroom by Garry Kasparov
Five Things I Think I Think (with a nod to Peter King for this idea)
1. The NFL announced that Madonna will be the half-time entertainment at the Super Bowl. Nothing says entertainment like a 53-year-old woman singing “Like a Virgin.”
2. LSU vs. Alabama for the National Championship… yawn.
3. Poor OSU. Like the Texas Rangers, you have to ask, will they ever receive this opportunity again?
4. I took my son, Timothy, hunting on government owned land Saturday near Alto, Texas. We did not see a soul in the woods, and only a handful of people on the roads. I was pleasantly surprised, and I want to take him there again.
5. I don’t know about where you live, but at last, here in East Texas, we’re starting to get a little rain—for that I am grateful to God.
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