The story behind their success Part I

By Keith Thuerk | Financial Stewardship | 29 Aug 2025

Over the past year, I have been digging into what makes certain individuals unique in their success. What I uncovered is very inspiring, well to me at least. I trust you will enjoy the puzzle pieces connecting as much as I have. If this blog is successful I will release others I have researched.

Jeff Bezos

I believed like most people, that Jeff was just a lowly nerd starting Amazon in his garage. What I uncovered, was prior, to his garage endeavor he was a senior vice president at D. E. Shaw, a top hedge fund in New York. It was the kind of job people spend their career trying to land. I believe Jeff used what he saw at this high end hedge fund helped him look into the future and saw a vast need. That 'need' became one of the most powerful systems in the world today with Amazon and Amazon AWS. These two visions combined, eCommerce and Cloud computing have outpaced Walmart in the top retail spot and lead the Cloud Hyperscale industry.

If you look at Amazon through history's lens you see Amazon as the modern Rome. Its warehouses are fortresses, it's Prime membership could be construed as citizenship. It's supply chain are Roman highways. Overall he locks entire markets into his empire. He didn't learn this in school, he learned it on Wall Street.

Bill gates

My understand of Bill he was a spry young lad that 'borrowed' software code from IBM and Apple then amalgamated it into the most successful selling desktop operating system in the world. If we peel back the layers we uncover the Bill had inspiring parents. His father’s Influence: William H. Gates Sr. was a respected attorney and civic leader. He co-founded a prominent Seattle law firm and was active in philanthropy, helping lay the groundwork for the Gates family’s future charitable legacy. Additionally, Bill's Mother’s Mary Maxwell Gates was a schoolteacher, civic activist, and a pioneering businesswoman. She served on prestigious boards, including United Way and First Interstate BancSystem. She also facilitated early tech connections that helped shape Microsoft’s future.

Unraveling their financial standing: The Gates family was comfortably upper-middle-class, not ultra-wealthy, but well-positioned. Bill's upbringing offered access to excellent education and social environments, yet wasn't rooted in inherited wealth.

Why did I do this study?

I wanted to see who started off better, yes the entire nature vs nurture discussion. But, I believe fundamentally that IF certain lessons are instilled early and often enough the result can compound and lead to unlocking potential results. To summarize, my assumptions they all had very functional and present parents, defining guardrails, defining boundaries, exposing life's lessons early and often. The things you do not see are parents that we struggling to make 'ends meat', drug addicts or recovering from abusive situations. You might see elevated school exposures, perhaps elite tutoring and business exposure to alleviate fears and leap frog understandings. Sure, they all have that inner desire to be different and make a name for themselves. This research also showed me perception is not always the reality that has been presented as reality.

Summary

Jeff & Bill both learned strategies early that are never taught in school! First discovery is the elite use money as a tool, not a goal. I hope to uncover more of these insights and share them out.