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Founders: #133 Edwin Land (Polaroid and The Man Who Invented It)

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What I learned from reading Land’s Polaroid: A Company and The Man Who Invented It by Peter C. Wensberg. ---- [1:14] He was revered to an extraordinary extent by most of the people who worked for him. [1:36] Land did not earn a college degree, yet he has received more medals and scientific honors than most living Americans. [3:36] Land's life seemed to be primarily a life of the mind. His great dramas were largely self created, played on the stage of Polaroid, which he constructed for himself. [4:14] All of the people that you and I are studying on this podcast created their own world within the world. [5:55] The end this book made me think of this quote by Steve Jobs: Remembering that I'll be dead soon is the most important tool I've ever encountered to help me make the big choices in life. Almost everything--all external expectations, all pride, all fear of embarrassment or failure--these things just fall away in the face of death, leaving only what is truly important. Remembering that you are going to die is the best way I know to avoid the trap of thinking you have something to lose. You are already naked. There is no reason not to follow your heart. [7:38] Peter [the author] w

[00:00:00] Polaroid as a company was for 45 years virtually synonymous with Edwin Land. He was its founder. He invented its first products, and indeed many of its products and processes, throughout the five decades of the company's history. His titles, during most of the period from 1937 to 1982, included Chairman of the Board, President, Chief Executive Officer, Chief Oper operating officer, and director of research. Although he cultivated a legend of privacy and inaccessibility to the press, he remained, far and away, the best-known member of the company, for many years the only one…

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