Athletes & Team Owners
Actors
Writers & Artists
Scientists
Inventors
100
Was cut from his high school basketball team.
Who is Michael Jordan
100
Was told that he would not be a good actor.
Who is Harrison Ford
100
Was fired by the editor of a paper because he "lacked imagination and had no good ideas. His first business went bankrupt.
Who is Walt Disney
100
Did not speak until he was four and did not read until he was seven, causing his teachers and parents to think he was mentally handicapped, slow and anti-social. Won the Nobel Prize and changed the face of modern physics.
Who is Albert Einstein
100
His first business Traf-O-Data failed. He also Dropped out of Harvard.
Who is Bill Gates
200
for decades he held the record for strikeouts. but then set the home run record (714 during his career) in the process.
Who is Babe Ruth
200
Wrote the script for rocky but they were not going to let him act in it.
Who is Sylvester Stallone
200
During his lifetime, he sold only one painting, and this was to a friend and only for a very small amount of money. He was never a success during his life, he kept on painting, sometimes starving to complete over 800 known works.
Who is Vincent Van Gogh
200
Never did particularly well in school and when put in charge of running the family farm, he failed miserably, so poorly in fact that an uncle took charge and sent him off to Cambridge where he finally blossomed into the scholar we know today.
Who is Isaac Newton
200
Failed multiple times before finally getting a plane that could get airborne and stay airborne.
Who are the Wright Brothers
300
This coach brought his team two Super Bowl victories, five NFC Championship victories and holds the records for the record for the most career wins. He also has one of the worst first seasons on record (winning no games) and winning five or fewer over the next four seasons
Who is Tom Landry
300
The first time this young comedian walked on stage at a comedy club, he looked out at the audience, froze and was eventually jeered and booed off of the stage. He knew he could do it, so he went back the next night, completed his set to laughter and applause.
Who is Jerry Seinfeld
300
Today is hailed for his research and experimentation with liquid-fueled rockets, but during his lifetime his ideas were often rejected and mocked by his scientific peers who thought they were outrageous and impossible.
Who is Robert Goddard
300
Was fired from apple. Went on to start Pixar and NeXT. NeXt was later purchased by apple.
Who is Steve Jobs
400
This tennis player was rejected from even being a lowly ball boy for a Davis Cup tennis match because event organizers felt he was too clumsy and uncoordinated. He went on to prove them wrong, showcasing his not-so-clumsy skills by winning Wimbledon, U. S. Open and eight Davis Cups.
Who is Stan Smith
400
Had thirteen Emmy nominations and four wins, also earning the Lifetime Achievement Award from the Kennedy Center Honors. Was widely regarded as a failed actress. Even her drama instructors didn't feel she could make it, telling her to try another profession.
Who is Lucille Ball
400
Before she published a series of novels she was nearly penniless, severely depressed, and divorced. She went from depending on welfare to survive to being one of the richest women in the world in a span of only five years through her hard work and determination.
Who is J. K. Rowling
400
Gave up on having a medical career and was often chastised by his father for being lazy and too dreamy. Today is well-known for his scientific studies.
Who is Charles Darwin
400
Went bankrupt twice and broke 5 times on his quest to mass produce a car.
Who is Henry Ford
500
He was a failure as a carpenter, cook and waiter, who didn’t even know how to open a bottle of wine. Fast forward to now, he is now the billionaire owner of NBA’s Dallas Mavericks.
Who is Mark Cuban
500
Was initially rejected by Hollywood studio chiefs because they felt it was a little too nonsensical to ever sell.
Who is Charlie Chaplin
500
His first book received 30 rejections, finally causing him to give up and throw it in the trash. His wife fished it out and encouraged him to resubmit it. He now has hundreds of books published with the distinction of being one of the best-selling authors of all time.
Who is Stephen King
500
This big name in psychology received a “C” in his first college introductory psychology class with his teacher telling him that, "there was already a famous Sternberg in psychology and it was obvious there would not be another." Later Graduated from Stanford with exceptional distinction in psychology and became the President of the American Psychological Association.
Who is Robert Sternberg
500
Created Sony. First product was a rice cooker that burned rice more than it cooked it.
Who is Akio Morita
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