Russ: Good morning. This is The BusinessMakers Show, heard here and online at thebusinessmakers.com. And this is that show about innovators, about entrepreneurs-entrepreneurs from early stage startups to major big-name success stories.

John: That's right-they're the artists and the athletes of the free enterprise system.

Russ: All right, and here's our lineup for this morning. First up for the Aflac BusinessMakers Flashback, last week, the Rice Alliance held their eighth annual Life Science Technology Venture Forum, and we were there. There were 30 companies presenting cool solutions to our health problems and challenges, and as always the case, we captured the elevator pitches of about 30 companies, so our flashback-John and I are going to feature three of our favorites. And then all of them are going to be on the WebXtra at thebusinessmakers.com. And then for our featured guest segment, staying in the life sciences category, our guest is Will Rosellini, the President and CEO of MicroTransponder the company combating chronic pain with a wireless neurostimulation system that offers cool solutions to this awful health problem. And prior to heading down this life science path, Will Rosellini was a major league pitcher with the Arizona Diamondbacks.

John: Wow.

Russ: Cool, cool story.

John: Yeah.

Russ: But first...that's right, it's time for The BusinessMakers School of Business, and this isn't your ordinary "business as usual" school. And we kick off the School of Business each Saturday morning, first with a quote of the day.

John: Quote of the day.

Russ: And I have chosen a quotation from General Dwight David Eisenhower this morning.

John: That's right. You know-and over the years, his reputation as a great president has been enhanced-

Russ: Yeah. All right. And here's the quote, "I never saw a pessimistic general win a battle."

John: That's right.

Russ: So if you went in there kind of thinking, "This isn't going to turn out very good," it almost-

John: Yeah, you want people on your team to think you can accomplish the objective.

Russ: All right. And that brings us to this week in business history-what happened in this third week in June in business history, John?

John: Okay. This week in business history, in 1867, barbed wire is patented by Lucien B. Smith of Ohio.

Russ: Well, that's important.

John: 1867-that's right after the Civil War.

Russ: You bet.

John: This week in business history in 1870, the first section of the Atlantic City, New Jersey boardwalk opens, and if it weren't for that-you know-we wouldn't have the game Monopoly-

Russ: That's right.

John: -because that was invented by a New Jersey guy that wanted to make this.

Russ: Yeah. I was on that boardwalk there in Atlantic City when I was five years old.

John: Have you ever been under the boardwalk?

[Music: "Under the Boardwalk"]

John: All right. This week in business history, in 1876-and this is one of my favorite items in American history.

Russ: Yeah.

John: This week in business history, on the Little Bighorn River in Montana, Lieutenant Colonel George Custer is wiped out, along with his Company of soldiers by Sioux Indians and Cheyenne Indians and Arapaho Indians, and he was wiped out. The only survivor was a horse named Comanche.

Russ: Really?

John: Right. Yeah.

Russ: Yeah.

John: There's just always been this debate on how someone that smart can get wiped out. And the fact is, he underestimated the size of his opponent, because he attacked the village there on Little Bighorn and not only was he driven back, but they eventually surrounded his entire complement of soldiers, and they were killed to the last man, except for the horse.

Russ: So he was outnumbered?

John: He was outnumbered the Sioux had about 3000 Indians, and Custer had about two or 300 soldiers.

Russ: Okay.

John: And there's also been this big debate about the technology, and the basic union soldier standard issue rifle was a Springfield, which is a single-shot.

Russ: Oh.

John: You shot the bullet, you had to pull the breach up, pull the bullet up, put another one in-

Russ: And load another one in.

John: -and load another one in, and the Sioux and the Arapaho and all the other Indians-there were no government-issued rifles for the Indians, so they had whatever they could find, and some of them had the repeater rifles-

Russ: Oh, wow.

John: -with the hand lever like The Rifleman Chuck Connors.

Russ: Right. Oh, yeah.

John: And they had a lot of those, supposedly, but the only way Custer would've won that battle would've been, like, carpet-bombing the village with B-52s or a couple of Abrams tanks. Plus, he divided his forces-because he had some of his command attack this village from another direction and they were, of course, unsuccessful.

Russ: The battle is referred to all the time in history, and I never got this much detail about what happened, but it almost always seemed like he expected to go in there and whip them all up.

John: Yeah, right.

Russ: Yeah. But it didn't work out that way at all.

John: No, it didn't - obviously not because his entire command was wiped out, including him.

Russ: Yeah, except for-

John: Except for the horse-

Russ: -the horse.

John: -Comanche. Now, the other interesting thing about this is at this time, the United States was celebrating its centennial, and when word got back that their hero, Custer wiped out by Indians-

Russ: Yeah.

John: I mean, the place went nuts.

Russ: Wow.

John: The whole country was in, like-I mean, I guess we're not as far advanced as we thought.

Russ: Wow. So that was 133 years ago. Wow.

John: That's right. All right. Moving on, this week in business history in 1893, the first Ferris wheel premieres at the Chicago's Columbian Exposition. The original Ferris wheel was designed by George Washington Gale Ferris, Jr and so landmark for the fair.

Russ: Okay. Cool.

John: And how about that.

Russ: Cool.

John: This week in business history, in 1895, the first female PhD in science was earned by Caroline Willard Baldwin.

Russ: Wow.

John: Okay.

Russ: Cool. Interesting.

John: All right.

Russ: All right.

John: Women's rights-let's hear it.

Russ: Yeah, yeah.

John: Okay. Later on, in 1901, in this week in business history, the first exhibition by Pablo Picasso, 19 years old, opens in Paris.

Russ: Wow. Yeah, he was a hit from the very beginning.

John: Yeah, right. And of course, we now know that some of his most famous paintings went down with the Titanic. Because in the movie, it showed the paintings.

Russ: Yeah, yeah.

John: And Kate Winslet owned the paintings.

Russ: That's right.

John: They're down at the bottom of the ocean with Leonardo DiCapro, who could've been saved, by the way. She was thinking about her paintings she just lost or something. God, I can't believe that. Okay.

Russ: All right.

John: This week in business history, in 1907, E.W. Scripps found the United Press, now called UPI.

Russ: Yeah.

John: Yeah.

Russ: Okay.

John: This week in business history, in 1910-too bad Elliot Spitzer didn't read about this-but Mann Act is passed for no women across state lines for immoral purposes.

Russ: Oh, wow. Yeah.

John: And you all know about Elliot Spitzer.

Russ: He would've known about the Mann Act.

John: -he would've known about the Mann Act-

Russ: Yeah, yeah because he did actually cross state lines-

John: Oh, he did.

Russ: -with her, I think, didn't he?

John: Well, actually, he brought her down later.

Russ: Is that when-?

John: Yeah, he gave her a train ticket. Okay.

Russ: Okay. So maybe that's like a loophole in the Mann Act.

John: Yeah, right. This week in business history, in 1911, the NAACP incorporates in New York.

Russ: Wow. And they're still going strong.

John: Yeah, right. It started out, I think, as a legitimate organization, and it stayed that way for many, many years. But it's become so politicized-it's just a liberal lobbying group.

Russ: Right.

John: Right.

Russ: Okay.

John: So this week in business history, in 1916, Mary Pickford becomes the first female star to get a million-dollar contract.

Russ: In 1916, a million-dollar contract.

John: Yeah, she was one of the ones that started going against the studio contracts.

Russ: Yeah, yeah.

John: Okay.

John: Yeah. This week in business history, in 1926, the first college board administers the first SAT exam.

Russ: Wow.

John: That's who we have to thank for that.

Russ: Yeah, there you go.

John: I never did like that test-I don't know, but it was tough.

Russ: Right.

John: You probably did real well-you were-

Russ: Well, it was so different back you and I did it. I did pretty good, but now, man, they take it six times and there's all that kind of stuff going on.

John: Oh, it's terrible.

Russ: Yeah.

John: Okay. This week in business history, in 1936, Jesse Owens of the United States sets 100-meter record a 10.2 seconds.

Russ: Oh, man. He was unbelievable, but-

John: That's right.

Russ: -to put it in perspective, the guy Usain Bolt did that same race in 9.69 seconds this last Olympics. But there's been a lot of improvements-shoes, training, track surface, and stuff-but anyway-

John: This week in business history, in 1944, Congress charters the Central Intelligence Agency.

Russ: Wow. Well, that's kind of an interesting arm of our enforcement. Boy, it's been effective at times and ineffective at times.

John: Yeah. What really hurt our intelligence gathering ability was the church committee back in the seventies.

Russ: Yeah, with Jimmy Carter.

John: Yeah. And it-so we had to deal with only nice guys.

Russ: Yeah, that's right.

John: And if you're an espionage and you're trying to penetrate dictatorships, you're not going to be dealing with-

Russ: Many nice guys.

John: -priests and rabbis.

Russ: That's right.

John: Okay. This week in business history, in 1944 Nazis begin mass extermination of Jews in Auschwitz.

Russ: Yeah.

John: Most of the Jews were killed in these concentration camps the last year of the war. So if they wouldn't have held Patton back-because Patton was ready to go into Germany, and they held them like, in the fall.

Russ: Who's "they"?

John: Dwight D. Eisenhower-

Russ: Yeah.

John: -who we quoted, thought he would divert supplies to Montgomery to go into Holland.

Russ: Okay.

John: You know, if you really want to conquer Germany, you don't conquer Holland first you go right in.

Russ: Right.

John: This week in business history, in 1948 Columbia commits the 33 and 1/3 RPM records and phases out 78ths as Dr. Peter Goldmark of CBS demonstrates the long-playing record.

Russ: Well, there's another one of those media things-it's just like, the Betamax, VHS tape. I mean, it happens all the time-whatever media is in wins.

John: That's right.

Russ: And then 45s kind of took some of it away-you know.

John: Yeah, because they were handy and small and-

Russ: Yeah.

John: Okay. This week in business history, in 1949, Hopalong Cassidy becomes the first network western.

Russ: Man, I was a fan of Hopalong Cassidy.

John: I know. The interesting this is the guy who played Hopalong Cassidy was William Boyd and he was the first one to negotiate for residuals.

Russ: Yeah. Wow.

John: Which means every time the show is played in reruns-

Russ: He got some money. Yeah.

John: He got some money.

Russ: He knew what he was doing. Cool.

John: He knew what he was doing.

Russ: All right.

John: All right. This week in business history, in 1950, the Korean conflict begins. North Korea invades South Korea.

Russ: Right.

John: This is 1950-this was like four or five years after World War II and boom we are in another war.

Russ: I know. So that was 59 years ago.

John: Okay. This week in business history, in 1959, Along Came Jones by The Coasters peaks at number nine on the charts.

[Music: "Along Came Jones"]

Russ: Good song.

John: In 1963-just four years later-the Beatles are around, and they formed Beatles Limited to handle their income.

Russ: Probably to handle their income and their taxes.

John: Yeah, right. Well, so they could shelter it from the tax man.

Russ: That's right.

John: Right.

[Music: "Taxman"]

John: Okay. This week in business history, in 1963, the U.S. and USSR agreed to set up a hotline.

Russ: Yeah.

John: Okay? This is between Kennedy and Khrushchev.

Russ: Yeah, and and what was so cool about it is that for the first time, it was like an acknowledgement-"You know-we can have a screw-up or an idiot on one of our sides start a whole nuclear war, and we don't want that to happen, so let's start to set up these hotlines so we can talk.

John: This week in business history, in 1967, Muhammad Ali convicted of refusing induction into the Armed Services.

Russ: Okay.

John: This week in business history, in 1969, 150,000 people attend Newport in '67. Okay. That is the jazz festival-

Russ: Oh, yeah.

John: -or the rock festival. Jimi Hendrix gets $120,000 to appear.

Russ: That was probably big bucks for a rock star back then.

[Music: "Castles Made of Sand"]

John: Right. This week in business history, in 1970, President Nixon signs the 26th Amendment, lowering the voting age to 18. Now, this week in business history, in 1975, Jaws by Steven Spielberg opens.

Russ: Were you a big fan of that?

John: Oh, yeah. That was a great movie.

Russ: Yeah.

John: Except a couple times, you could tell it was a mechanical shark.

Russ: Yeah, hacked me off.

John: Yeah. Anyway, this week in business history in 1977, oil enters a trans-Alaskan pipeline and exits 38 days later at Valdez.

Russ: Wow.

John: It took 38 days to get from Prudhoe, I guess, to Valdez.

Russ: Wow.

John: Yeah, that's hard.

Russ: That's interesting.

John: Yeah.

Russ: Cool.

John: Okay.

Russ: All right.

John: This week in business history in 1977, Elvis Presley sings in Indianapolis, the last performance of his career.

Russ: Whoa.

[Music: "Burning Love"]

John: Okay. This week in business history, in 2004, Spaceship One becomes the first privately-funded space plane to achieve space flight.

Russ: Whoa. That was the Paul Allen thing and Burt Rutan.

John: Yeah.

Russ: -interesting deal. Okay.

John: Yeah.

Russ: That wraps it up, hey? Man, a lot of history happened in this in this week.

John: Okay. Well-you know-we do what we can to inform you.

Russ: Good job. Okay. And that brings us to navigating business jargon. This is our modern vocabulary test.

John: Uh-hunh (Affirmative).

Russ: We turned it into a test where I get to go out and choose and select the word, and I say the word and then John takes a crack at seeing if he can guess the meaning of the word.

John: Yeah. Sometimes I do well, and sometimes I don't.

Russ: That's right. And this morning's word is micro-boredom. It's a hyphenated word-micro hyphen boredom.

John: Yeah. All right. Micromanagement is when you, someone is overseeing in a way that is bothersome, someone that's conducting the office.

Russ: Yeah.

John: Okay. So micro-boredom is probably not that.

Russ: You're right. We got-he's a winner today.

John: Okay. Micro-boredom is when people are bored for small amounts of time. Everybody's got a short attention span, so I'm thinking boredom is part of that. So you become bored momentarily-a microburst of boredom-and then you get onto something else, which may amuse you, but that may be a small burst of amusement before you go back into the micro-boredom stage.

Russ: So it'd be micro-amusement?

John: Micro-amusement.

Russ: Okay. Well, I don't know how-

John: Or if you're scoping out the chicks at a singles bar there might be a microscope.

Russ: Yeah.

John: Okay. All right.

Russ: Let's see what it is. I don't think I can give it to you.

John: All right.

Russ: What it is, is what we used to call downtime, now increasingly filled by fiddling with mobiles or BlackBerrys. Those who market these devices or the services they use see it as an opportunity to sell us something. So here you are, you don't have anything to do. What do you do? You pull out your BlackBerry, you pull out your iPhone, and you start fiddling with it, and that's micro-boredom.

John: I think mine's a better definition.

Russ: Okay.

John: All right.

Russ: All right. And that brings us to dumbest moments-do you have a story for us this morning, John?

John: Yeah, here's a politician who probably regrets doing this, now that this is out in the public.

Russ: Okay.

John: As you all know, stock plummeted starting back in September.

Russ: Yes, it did.

John: And the Senate's number two Democrat is Dick Durbin, and he was privy to a lot of information the night before when Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke and Treasury Secretary Hank Paulson were briefing them on what was about to come down in the U.S. economy.

Russ: Yeah.

John: So Durbin, who's no dummy, you could say this may have been a smart move, but this is what a lot of CEOs get thrown in jail for.

Russ: Right.

John: Dick Durbin acted on this private moment the next day and sold $115,000 worth of stocks and mutual fund shares, and used much of the money to invest in Warren Buffett's Berkshire-Hathaway.

Russ: Well, that might have been financially smart, but politically stupid.

John: Exactly. That's what I mean.

Russ: Right.

John: Right. Yeah, I think so-

Russ: Yeah.

John: -because we want our representatives, regardless of what party to set an example.

Russ: Yeah.

John: And so I think he's hurt himself politically on this.

Russ: Oh, yeah.

John: If I were ever going to run against him-

Russ: Yeah.

John: -I would definitely bring this up as a double standard.

Russ: Yeah.

John: Chief of Staff says he didn't really capitalize on anything. Paulson and Bernanke told Congressional leaders at the September 18th meeting-and that was a meeting the night before but it wasn't secret or classified information; it was disclosed publically the next day anyway.

Russ: Right.

John: But how do you know there wasn't something else said that wasn't-you know-

Russ: That's right.

John: That meeting lasted a long time.

Russ: That's right.

John: So anyway, dumb moment for Dick Durbin. He may pay for this down the road.

Russ: Well, and he probably didn't do that well with Berkshire-Hathaway because they plummeted, but it showed that he said, "Man, I've got to do something with this information,"

John: Yeah.

Russ: Even if it was a mistake. All right.

John: Yeah. All right.

Russ: All right. I think that qualifies.

John: Well, thank you.

Russ: All right. And before we wrap up the School of Business, it's time for the very popular PKF Texas Entrepreneur's Playbook.

John: Hey, there he is.

Russ: So let's welcome Greg Price on the piano.

John: Our favorite accountant, Greg Price.

Russ and John: A one, and a two, and a

[PKF Texas - The Entrepreneurs Playbook]

Russ: Okay. And that wraps up the School of Business. Stay tuned for the Aflac BusinessMakers Flashback with elevator pitches from the Rice Alliance, and then our guest segment with Will Rosellini, the President and CEO of MicroTransponder, out in the world to try to cure pain. You're listening to The BusinessMakers Show, heard here and online at thebusinessmakers.com.