Happy birthday to Sir Arthur Conan Doyle! If the author of the Sherlock Holmes stories were still alive, he would be 147 years old today.
Doyle had entrepreneur blood running through his veins. Although he graduated from medical school, and practiced as a doctor for many years, he was never really happy working for other people.
Even when he had his own medical practice, his true love was writing. Late in life, he married for a second time, had two children in addition to the two he had fathered by his deceased first wife, and decided to give up his medical practice so that he could devote more time to writing the kind of material he wanted to. He had grown very tired of Sherlock Holmes, and had, in fact, killed him off, causing over 20,000 people to cancel their subscriptions to the magazine that carried the Holmes stories.
Perhaps he summed up the entrepreneurial spirit for all of us when he wrote these words recalling the moment he made his decision, while he was very sick with the flu, to follow his heart and do what he loved best.
"With a wild rush of joy, I remember in my delight taking the handkerchief which lay upon the coverlet in my enfeebled hand, and tossing it up to the ceiling in my exultation. I should at last be my own master."
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