Shane Parrish

Dallas, Texas, August 1963.

Mary Kay Ash is sitting at breakfast with her husband George going over plans for their cosmetics company.

They're one month away from opening.

She's put her entire life savings into this.

Everything they have is on the line.

Then something terrible happens.

George collapses face first onto the table with a heart attack.

He was dead before the ambulance arrived.

Everyone around Mary Kay tells her to stop opening the company, get whatever money back she can, and find a job.

You can't do this alone, her accountant says.

You're going to go bankrupt.

Mary Kay doesn't say anything.

She buries her husband.

Then she sits down with her youngest son Richard and asks him to quit his well-paying job and help her launch this company for almost no money.

He says yes immediately.

Her older son can't leave his job.

He has a family.

But he pulls out his checkbook and writes her a check for $4,500, every penny he saved since he was a kid.

He hands it to her.

One month after the funeral, she opens the doors.