TRUE BELIEVERS PERSIST
Ralph Waldo Emerson once said, “A believer is never disturbed because other persons do not yet see the fact which he see.” Charles Goodyear was a believer, even though others could not yet see what he saw. At one point in his life, in fact, he actually had himself thown into jail in order to gain time to reach his goals. One of America’s ten great industrial inventors, Goodyear was a failure for years; he owed money to friends, neighbors, and relatives who had staked him. He was penniless in 1838 when he discovered the method of vulcanizing rubber. But by that time, with his invention still to be perfected, creditors had begun to hound him. Despite his repugnance to the idea, he fled to the protection of the bankruptcy laws. Soon afterward he was thrown into jail for contempt of court and there, unmolested behind prison bars, he perfected his rubber process. He not only paid off his creditors but…
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