Go a step further Harvey S. Firestone (1868-1938) founded Firestone Tire and Rubber Company in 1900 with an investment of which made him half owner of the business. The company originally sold rubber tires for carriages. In 1904 they began making tires for an emerging new form of transportation, the automobile. Firestone developed several techniques for the manufacture of pneumatic tires, which were used on Ford Motor Company’s Model T. John Burroughs) was a nationally prominent naturalist. After a successful early career as a treasury clerk and national bank examiner, he devoted the remainder of his years to writing and fruit growing. The author of such books as Signs and Seasons, Camping and Tramping with Roosevelt, and The Breath of Life, Burroughs was a Thoreau-like figure who went on celebrated camping trips with the likes of Theodore Roosevelt and fellow naturalist John Muir. Luther Burbank was the father of modern scientific plant breeding. 4 If you find Research has consistently shown that maintaining a positive attitude—about yourself and about life—can affect more than your financial condition. It can help you live longer. Ina study of boys conducted in California beginning in 1921, researchers found that pessimists in the group were 25 percent more likely to die before age 65 than positive thinkers. Researchers at the University of Wisconsin’s Brain Imaging and Behavior Laboratory found that positive-thinking, optimistic subjects had higher levels of “killer-cells” and had less of a decline in immune system response when faced with stressful situations. “Self-esteem has to do with self-valuing, self- respect, a kind of confidence and a willingness to speak one’s truth,” says Emmett E. Miller, author of Deep Healing The Essence of Mind/Body Medicine, in a USA Weekend article. “That’s a tonic to the immune system, to all the organs of the body.”