A Class with Drucker - Headway | Work on yourself

APPROACH PROBLEMS WITH YOUR IGNORANCE ■ 67
imagining himself riding on a beam of light and as what would transpire
to time on earth during his speed-of-light trip.
Inventing the Sewing Machine
In the 1840’s, Elias Howe knew nothing about sewing or the struggles of
predecessors over a hundred years in trying to invent a machine that could
sew as effectively, but much faster, than a human seamstress or tailor. In fact,
he was a young man still in his twenties. However, Howe was fascinated <strong>with</strong>
the use of a machine to increase the speed in repetitious patterns of sewing.
He had an idea that such a machine would work if he used thread from
two different sources. The problem was that a standard needle threaded
through a hole at the back of the needle would not work. One night he
went to sleep and had a strange dream that he recalled in the morning. He
was on a desert island and attacked by natives. The natives were armed
<strong>with</strong> strange spears. Each spear was attached to a rope, not from its shaft
as one might expect in a whaling harpoon, but from a hole threaded
through the spearhead. When he awoke and remembered his dream, Howe
instantly grasped this as a solution for his sewing machine needle. It was
now possible in his machine for the needle to be pushed through the cloth.
This created a loop on the other side; a shuttle on a track then slipped the
second thread through the loop, creating what is now called a lockstitch.
The Right Brain Leads to Silly Putty
During World War II, most rubber came from rubber trees grown in the
Southwest Pacific, which were under Japanese control. In 1943, General
Electric engineer James Wright was attempting to create a synthetic rubber
by mixing boric acid and silicone oil. He came up <strong>with</strong> a product which had
extremely unusual properties. When dropped, the material bounced to an
unusual height. It was impervious to rot. It was also soft and malleable. It
could even be stretched many times its length <strong>with</strong>out tearing. Finally, if
pressure was applied, it could copy the image of any printed material <strong>with</strong>
which it came in contact and to which pressure was applied. The only trouble
was, <strong>with</strong> all of these properties it was not a good substitute for rubber.
Wright went on to better things, but General Electric was intrigued
<strong>with</strong> this strange material and its unusual properties. General Electric had
a product, but <strong>with</strong>out a practical use. Fortunately, no one junked it. GE
sent the product all over the world to scientists, asking them to develop or
discover a use for it. None could.