Russ: Good morning. This is the BusinessMakers Show, heard here and seen online at TheBusinessMakers.com. This is that show that champions entrepreneurship, that features those that make business happen.

John: Yeah, they make it happen all right and by making it happen they make the country happen.

Russ: You bet. All right and before we get in to today lineup of I want to once again before time runs out tell you about the supreme office makeover that's being offered by one of our sponsor partners. It involves up to $17,500.00 in cool, up to date technology equipment offered by the giant hardware and software company PC Mall. They started their small business network about a year ago focused on the sweet spot in business and they're gaining members quite successfully and it's a cool network. To enter the supreme office makeover all you have to do is join the network by going to pcmallsbn.com/businessmakers. That's pcmallsbn.com/businessmakers. All right, and here's today's lineup. First up, Bill Arend, Regional Manager with Oracle once again is hosting one of his cool events called Smart Strategies to Keep Your Business Growing. This time it was in San Antonio and once again the event included a panel of veteran company leaders who have been through down economies before and I had the privilege of doing a group interview with the panel with Bill Arend. Additionally, for those that are really tuned into this topic we captured the entire panel discussion and have it available on The.com. Then that's going to be followed by an interview with the founder of Lemonade Day. That's Michael Holthouse who also happened to be the founder and former CEO of Paranet, that company that he had a very successful exit from, the kind of exit that a lot of people just go to the beach and hang out but -

John: Well people dream about the kind of exit that he had.

Russ: You bet. Boy, he's doing something very valuable with his time. Lemonade Day is such a cool, cool event. But first - [pause] that's right. It's time for the BusinessMakers School of Business and one reason it's cool is because it's powered by Champion Energy Services? What would we do without electricity from Champion Energy Services?

John: I know. We would be shouting this show from the rooftops I guess or go to town square which is what people used to go to to get their information.

Russ: Absolutely. Champion Energy Services is famous for easy to read bills. You know exactly what you're paying per kilowatt hour unlike the other guys. All right. That brings us to This Week in Business History. What happened during this November week in business history?

John: This week in business history in 1307 William Tell - this is a folk story. No one really knows if this really happened or not but according to my in depth research here William Tell shoots and apple off his son's head. Now what happened was William Tell had a run in with the local Bürgermeister over there in -

Russ: Bürgermeister?

John: Well the mayor, the governor.

Russ: Whatever it was. Right.

John: I mean who knows what it was. Punishment for having this run in was he had to shoot an apple off the kid's head and he did and that's the story.

Russ: All right. That's a great story. It happened this week?

John: Well if it hadn't have been for that legend or story - it could have been true. Nobody really - we never would have gotten the overture that became famous with the Lone Ranger.

Russ: There you go. So this is important.

John: It is important. Okay, this week in business history in 1800 John Adams becomes the first U.S. president to move into the White House which was still a fixer-upper at the time. I mean it hadn't been completed and Washington, D.C. was just a swamp pretty much. Still is. This week in business history in 1841 life preservers - you think 1841 that's pretty early for life preservers.

Russ: Yeah it is. It is.

John: But were made out of cork were patented by Napoleon Guerin in New York City. Made of - cork floats. Why not? Okay, this week in business history in 1863 President Abraham Lincoln delivers the Gettysburg Address. He was in the town of Gettysburg to commemorate the battlefield and the cemetery of that Civil War battle which happened actually about four months before he gave this address. He followed some other guy that spoke for about two hours and Lincoln gets up there and gives like a two minute speech and this becomes one of the most famous orations in the history of this country.

Russ: Boy, no kidding. There it is in stone in the Lincoln Memorial.

John: Yeah, in the Lincoln Memorial right there with his second inaugural address which is also a classic. Okay, this week in business history in 1865 the revolving firearm was patented by Smith and Wesson, H. Smith and D.B. Wesson of Springfield, Massachusetts. Now before that I guess these pistols were like single shots.

Russ: Single shot, yeah.

John: Now but they had to pull the hammer back and it was pretty - it was kind of hard. You had to do it with the other hand, the hand that wasn't holding the gun. Okay, this week in business history in 1896 a power plant at Niagara Falls begins operation.

Russ: Wow, hydroelectric.

John: This week in business history in 1904 the internal combustion engine is patented by J.F. Duryea of Springfield, Massachusetts. Man, another invention out of Springfield, Massachusetts. The safety razor is patented by King C. Gillette.

Russ: All in the same week.

John: All in the same -

Russ: Wow, have to go for -

John: Man, oh man, guns and razors and combustible engines. Okay, this week in business history in 1920 the League of Nations, one organization in a long line of failures of trying to bring world peace holds its first meeting in Geneva. I think the reason why they have all these problems with these organizations is they have such lofty titles and they always meet in Geneva or something like -

Russ: I mean there are definitely lots of critics of the United Nations but weren't there more critics of the League of Nations?

John: Yeah, I would say so because what happened was Germany was rearming and they wouldn't stop it. But now you've got Iran getting the nuke. No one's stepping forward to stop it. Moving right along here. This week in business history Buddy Holly makes his final recordings for Decca Records in 1956.

Russ: Great.

John: This week in business history Ray Charles had the first U.S. number one hit, Georgia on My Mind. Made it in 1960.

Russ: Wow.

John: He had a top ten the year earlier with What I'd Say, Hit the Road Jack, I can't Stop Loving You, which is my favorite song, by the way. But we'll go right ahead into 1969. This week in business history Wendy's Hamburgers opens.

Russ: The square hamburgers. Hamburgers are square from the beginning.

John: I don't know. You never know what's going to make you different, what's going to differentiate you from your competition and Wendy's made a go of it and it's very popular today. This week in business history in 1971 there's a Japanese company named Busicom that's building a new line of calculators and they needed 12 silicon chips to handle all the different calculations and functions and they ask Intel, a new fledgling company to do it and Intel said, "Well let's take all those 12 silicon chips and put it into one little microprocessor," and there we go. The first microprocessor.

Russ: Cool. Wow.

John: November 15th, 1971, man, that's not too long ago.

Russ: Wow, 29, 39 years ago.

John: Right. This week in business history in 1972 the Dow Jones closes above 1,000 for the first time.

Russ: I kind of - I remember that. I mean I was in college then at the time and it seemed quite significant that it went into that extra digit.

John: This week in business history in 1973 President Richard Nixon authorizes construction of the Alaskan Pipeline.

Russ: That was huge.

John: Oh huge.

Russ: Controversial at the time.

John: It still is but most people on the left would probably like to see the thing go away. Okay, this week in business history in 1977 the 100,000,000 U.S. built Ford rolled off the assembly line in Mahwah, New York.

Russ: Man, they're doing great these - not great but compared to these -

John: Hey, they're making money and they didn't take the bailout. I think they're probably glad some of the other car companies did because they all buy from the same suppliers pretty much. So if all of those companies would have gone out -

Russ: They would have had a supply problem probably.

John: A supply problem. Yes. So this week in business history ABC TV in 1979 announced it would broadcast nightly specials on the Iranian hostage mess.

Russ: Which led to Nightline, Ted Koppel.

John: Nightline, and yellow ribbons around trees all over Washington. This week in business history in 1992 Dateline NBC airs a demonstration showing how dangerous General Motors trucks are because the gas tank would blow up on impact. Later it was revealed that NBC rigged the test. They put a little explosive device by the gas tank.

Russ: I think just those little model rocket engines that - so it wasn't that big of a stretch.

John: So when the car crashes into the truck the little thing ignites and blows up the gas tank.

Russ: Yeah, which kind of forewarned a lot of people, "If you have one of those trucks you should go see if there's a little rocket engine right by the gasoline tank" -

John: A little rocket.

Russ: -"that's going to explode."

John: I said that's an option. It costs extra.

Russ: I was so hacked off when I heard about that. It decimated my opinion. You might have already - you were probably smart enough to already know that these guys are always lying to -

John: Well no. I said, "God." You don't know that when you see this stuff. It looks real. The arrogance and hubris is quite prevalent in that industry.

Russ: I agree totally.

John: This week in business history in 1993 the U.S. House of Representatives approves NAFTA, the North American Free Trade Act.

Russ: Yeah. Remember the debate. That was the best thing that Al Gore ever did when he tore up Ross Perot.

John: He's quite a bad year this year, Al Gore has. The masseuse.

Russ: Frisky poodle.

John: The masseuse and -

Russ: Divorce.

John: Yeah, he's getting divorced and - poor guy. I really feel sorry for him. Okay, this week in business history in 2004 Kmart announced that it's buying Sears Roebuck. What a story this was. $11 billion in naming the newly merged company Sears Holdings Corporation.

Russ: Yeah. Well we never thought that would happen but did. But the Sears name certainly has survived.

John: Well Sears has a lot more caché and then Kmart.

Russ: All right, so that wraps up this morning's history lesson?

John: That's all I got.

Russ: From William Tell to Kmart buying Sears.

John: I know.

Russ: Good lesson.

John: And everything in between.

Russ: You bet. You bet. All right, that brings us to the Jargon Challenge Round.

John: Yes.

Russ: Our vocabulary lesson that always sort of gets the adrenaline flowing here in the studio because the way that we have to present this is in a contest format where I get to go out and find a brand new word or if I can't find one as John likes to point out I'll just make it up.

John: That's right.

Russ: Then I say the word and -

John: That's right and I guess the definition.

Russ: That's right.

John: I've been - I've got - I think I've hit 60, 70 percent of these words -

Russ: I think you have.

John: -having never even heard of the word.

Russ: That's right.

John: It's no jive. It's the way we decided to do this. Almost by accident.

Russ: Right. Here's this morning's word is Pre-Dictionary.

John: Pre-Dictionary. Okay, we all know what a dictionary is, you look up words and their meanings and pronunciations and all that kind of thing. So pre-dictionary is when you assume the meaning of the word and the pronunciation thinking you don't have to look it up in the dictionary. So you make a per-dictionary move.

Russ: Wrong.

John: Okay.

Russ: A pre-dictionary is a dictionary of new words that are predicted to become part of the mainstream lexicon. It's before they made it to the dictionary.

John: Pre-dictionary?

Russ: Yeah.

John: So it's actually an adjective.

Russ: No, it's a noun. It is a dictionary of new words that are predicted to become part of the mainstream lexicon.

John: Oh so it's been published. It's called the pre-dictionary?

Russ: Yes.

John: Oh okay, this is probably where you get all your words from.

Russ: It is. All right, now that brings us to Dumb Moments in Business. Do we have a story this morning?

John: Well this is a result of a dumb moment because you and I have been decrying and criticizing this Cap and Trade mess -

Russ: Yes we have.

John: - and the - because what they're trying to do is regulate carbon dioxide which is what people breath out after they breathe in the oxygen and trees and green things out there take the carbon dioxide and make it - so I mean what's wrong with that? Right? Well the U.S. Government declared it a pollutant and because of that there was a lot of excitement among the left about making this Cap and Trade bill something that would be very important to society because it would regulate this so-called pollutant called carbon dioxide. They started putting some funds together and in this case the Chicago Climate Exchange where people can buy and sell -

Russ: And exchange.

John: - sell these carbon credits.

Russ: I've not bought any. Have you?

John: No, I have not. So if you're a company that's polluting too much you could buy a credit. You'd buy the credits. But anyway, it's kind of like a middle man.

Russ: That's right.

John: It's kind of like a den of thieves.

Russ: That's right.

John: But anyway, since there's no Cap and Trade, there's no excitement to pass the Cap and Trade this Climate Exchange has gone away.

Russ: Oh it's closing down?

John: It's closing down. A lot of people had a lot of money in this thing. It never went anywhere.

Russ: All right. Before we wrap up this morning's School of Business it's time for the very popular PKF Texas Entrepreneur's Playbook.

John: That's right.

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

John: Here he is. One and a two and a -

Russ: One and a two and a - [pause] all right, and that wraps up this morning's School of Business, powered by Champion Energy Services. Stay tuned in for Oracle's cool panel, Smart Strategies to Keep Your Business Growing followed by an interview of Michael Holthouse, founder of Lemonade Day. You're listening to the BusinessMakers Show, heard here and seen online at TheBusinessMakers.com.