Napoleon Hill was born into poverty in 1883, and as a teenager, began writing as a reporter for small newspapers. He had visions of becoming a lawyer, and did in fact enter law school, but financial constraints soon forced him to withdraw.

Then in 1908, industiralist Andrew Carnegie commissioned him to interview hundreds of successful men and women, in an effort to prove his theory that success could simplified down to a clear-cut formula.

Hill interviewed the most famous (and richest) people of the time, and The Success Formula was published in Hill’s 1928 book The Law of Success”. Hill reveals additional information on his success formula in the most famous of his works, “Think and Grow Rich”, published in 1937. It has sold more than thirty million copies to date.