Ambition

They were two bicycle mechanics from Ohio with no formal engineering training and no funding who set out to solve a problem that had stumped the best minds in the world.   It took them four years of learning, experimenting, and overcoming numerous challenges, but they accomplished what many people around the world thought was impossible. This is the story of the Wright Brothers, and we have a lot...

He dropped out of school at 13 to support his family. His father abandoned them. He worked full time for a decade before buying his first newspaper. By the time he died at 84, he had built the greatest publishing empire in American history. This is the story of S.I. Newhouse Sr., and we have a lot to learn from him.  Source for this episode:  Newspaperman: S.I. Newhouse and the Business of News by...

Ambition is a podcast about history's most ambitious people and the lessons their lives can teach you. Each episode goes deep on one person (or two), built around hours of research into a biography of that subject, covering what they built, how they thought, and the struggles they overcame along the way. We're kicking things off with two stories: S.I. Newhouse, who built one of the most powerful m...