Henry Ford asked my grandfather to invest a company that would mass produce cars. He believed the public would want them. My grandfather could see little use for machines that caught on fire, smelled bad, and needed explosive gas to run. What was wrong with horses, trains, and ships (he owned a huge merchant marine fleet).

My grandfather went broke in the depression and Ford became one of the wealthiest Americans of his time. Was he lucky... was my grandfather unlucky, since it was the Depression and collapse in demand that drove him broke? Yes and no...

Historically most of the wealthy bet everything they had on an idea that panned out. Luck or insight...