CHAPTER15Parents, Mentors,and Role Models:Looking Over the Pickle Barrel

Who’s the teacher? Who’s the student?

—Leo McCarthyFormer California Lieutenant Governor

We’re all just links in a chain.

—Bob Dylan

Think back to your formative years: grammar school, high school, even college, and your first job. Who was there for you? Who saw the talent, the intelligence, the possibilities in you that you could not see in yourself? Does more than one person come to mind? An uncle or an aunt? A grandparent, a neighbor, or a teacher?

For Steve Blank, who grew up in New York City, the seeds that would lead to his achievements were sown by his immigrant parents:

They came over in steerage, and took the tour of New York Harbor under the Statue of Liberty. ...

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