
The story of Timothy Dexter - swalsh
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Timothy_Dexter
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lylemckeany
>In the second edition Dexter added an extra page which consisted of 13 lines
of punctuation marks. Dexter instructed readers to "peper and solt it as they
plese".

...zero f*cks given.

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terhechte
My mom had this saying from her grandfather which was something like "While a
smart guy still contemplates an opportunity, the simple one has already gone
there and seized it". Oftentimes because he never thinks about the danger of
his action, he just does.

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bhz
I think my favorite part is the ASCII art from 1798:
[http://books.google.com/books?id=uboNAAAAYAAJ&pg=PA36#v=...](http://books.google.com/books?id=uboNAAAAYAAJ&pg=PA36#v=onepage&q&f=false)

(Yes, ASCII wasn't around in 1798.)

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ChristianMarks
My takeaway from this is that brains are superfluous in business and may even
be a hindrance. Actually a bimodal distribution with Dexter on one end and
Bezos on the other is more likely to be beneficial.

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K2h
...And for him, timing was everything. That is my take away.

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peter_l_downs
What a great story! I have no idea how this is relevant to HN but I found it
hilarious.

~~~
swalsh
It really is just a great story... but deep down I think there's some good
business lessons here.

Luck matters, but deep down I think his luckiest break was having a great boat
captain. The guy found profit in the most unlikeliest of places by
improvising.

~~~
pavel_lishin
I'd love to read about his story, but I'd wager that he wasn't notable enough;
it would be interesting to find his journal.

"August 17th, 1782. The idiot sent us to the West Indies with a boat-load of
warming pans. It was only through my ingenuity and hustle that I was able to
convince the locals that they would make excellent ladles - we actually
managed to turn a profit! I can already imagine the smug look on Dexter's face
when we tell him about this. I bet this will inspire him to send something
even more idiotic next time, like wool mittens. Note to self, don't show him
this journal lest he get any ideas."

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SteveGuttenberg
Curious

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roymabookie
what a LAD

