APRIL 2024 MAGAZINE

When I was a child ambition meant climbing steps as quickly as possible without nicking my shins on the way up. My mother was often sick so I ran her errands. I shopped at the grocery store and did her banking.  I was six years old.  When I entered the bank, the tellers fussed over me, smiling and giggling, because I was so small that I could hardly reach the window to make a deposit. Still, I reached higher and that meant standing on my...

“Ambition,” said Joseph Knecht, CEO and founder of VentureTech, “is not a standalone feeling.”

He’s talking about the fact that small startup companies often have one big limiting problem: they operate in a vacuum. According to Knecht, the answer is to surround oneself with passionate experts and reach out to potential customers before a product is developed to ensure it is something they’ll buy, even pre-selling it to guarantee...

Amidst a lush pineland forest, there exists a Victorian village and a deluge of suburban cul-de-sacs. Swaths of evergreens, tall and spindly, release their needles upon sandy soil. Natural beauty beckons you. Lured by a richly preserved history, refreshed by abundant lake-front communities, amused by young, contented parents returning to familiar surroundings of their youth, and welcomed by the friendly banter of downtown villagers, I found...