Stories of Successful People

When Thomas Edison invented the light bulb, he tried over 2000 experiments before he got it to work. A young reporter asked him how it felt to fail so many times. He said, "I never failed once. I invented the light bulb. It just happened to be a 2000-step process."

Wilma Rudolph was the 20th of 22 children. She was born prematurely and her survival was doubtful. When she was 4 years old, she contacted double pneumonia and scarlet fever, which left her with a paralysed left leg. At age 9, she removed the metal leg brace she had been dependent on and began to walk without it. By 13 she had developed a rhythmic walk, which doctors said was a miracle. That same year she decided to become a runner. She entered a race and came in last. For the next few years every race she entered, she came in last. Everyone told her to quit, but she kept on running. One day she actually won a race. And then another. From then on she won every race she entered. Eventually this little girl, who was told she would never walk again, went on to win three Olympic gold medals.

In 1962, four nervous young musicians played their first record audition for the executives of the Decca recording Company. The executives were not impressed. While turning down this group of musicians, one executive said, "We don't like their sound. Groups of guitars are on the way out."
They Created an English rock band and became one of the most commercially successful and critically acclaimed acts in the history of popular music.: The Beatles

In 1944, Emmeline Snively, director of the Blue Book Modelling Agency, told modelling hopeful Norma Jean Baker, "You'd better learn secretarial work or else get married."
She went on, won 54 World awards, and ranked as the sixth greatest female star : Marilyn Monroe

In 1954, Jimmy Denny, manager of the Grand Ole Opry, Fired a singer after one performance. He told him, "You ain't goin' nowhere....son. You ought to go back to drivin' a truck."
He went on to become the most popular singer in America named Elvis Presley.

When Alexander Graham Bell invented the telephone in 1876, it did not ring off the hook with calls from potential backers. After making a demonstration call, President Rutherford Hayes said, "That's an amazing invention, but who would ever want to use one of them?"
Today nearly 6.5 Billion people are using phones across this world !!

In the 1940s, another young inventor named Chester Carlson took his idea to 20 corporations, including some of the biggest in the country. They all turned him down. In 1947 - after seven long years of rejections! - he finally got a tiny company in Rochester, New York, the Haloid company, to purchase the rights to his invention - an electrostatic paper-copying process.
Haloid became Xerox Corporation we know today.

Colonel Sanders
When Colonel Sanders w 65 years old, he received his first social security check of US $99. He was broke. His only asset was a secret chicken recipe. He left his home in Kentucky and traveled to the many states in the US to sell this recipe. He offered his secret chicken recipe to many restaurants for free. All he wanted in return was a small percentage of the sales. However, he was shown the door by many restaurants.
” Get out of here. Who wants a recipe from a white Santa Claus?” the restaurant owners shouted, referring to the dress code Sanders adopted: a white shirt and white trousers.
Over 1,000 restaurants rejected his offer. How many of you would have quit after making one or two unsuccessful sales calls? On his 1,009th sales visit, one restaurant finally accepted his offer. Today, Kentucky Fried Chicken outlets and fatherly Colonel Sanders’ statures are found all over the world. He has changed the way the world ate chicken- finger-lickin’ good!

Fred Smith
When Fred Smith attended Yale University Business School, he wrote a project paper on the concept of overnight package delivery. The professor awarded Smith a “C minus” for it. This was because he reasoned the proposal had little potential as the postal industry was monopolized by the US Mail. Who would want to send a package through another courier when there was the US Mail? Undeterred, Smith put his money where his mouth was and started Federal Express. On the first day of business, his goal was to deliver 167 packages. However, he only delivered 7, 5 of which were packages sent to himself. Today, Federal Express is one of the World’s largest overnight delivery companies.


The Moral of the above Stories:

Character cannot be developed in ease and quiet. Only through experiences of trial and suffering can the soul be strengthened, vision cleared, ambition inspired and success achieved. You gain strength, experience and confidence by every experience where you really stop to look fear in the face.... You must do the thing you cannot do. And remember, the finest steel gets sent through the hottest furnace.

A winner is not one who never fails, but one who NEVER QUITS!

Source: http://www.allinspiration.com/Life/Stories/stories_of_successful_people.html
http://www.citehr.com/59666-inspiring-stories-successful-people.html