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Napoleon Hill's iconic personal development book 'Think And Grow Rich' details principles employed by successful people from Hill's era, the nineteen twenties and thirties, and is as useful and relevant today as it was then.

Many of Hill's Heroes, he admitted to a degree of hero worship, were famous industrialists like Henry Ford, inventors such as Thomas Edison, famous politicians like Woodrow Wilson and bankers such as JP Morgan. Others were less well known though still important figures such as Ichthyologist David Starr Jordan, or Elbert Hubbard instigator of an arts and crafts boom.

Perhaps the most modest and least known is Ralph A. Weeks. In 1929, after a year of driving for a bus company known as Ridge Road Express, Weeks purchased the company; a two-bus operation based in Jeddo, NY.

With Mr. Weeks behind the wheel of a 15 passenger 1927 Garford bus and Mrs. Weeks driving a seven-passenger Buick Sedan, Ridge Road Express began its first regularly scheduled line run, offering service between Lockport and Lyndonville NY along Ridge Road (Route 104).

But, as times changed, so did the company and today nearly 80 percent of the current operation is carrying students. With 300 buses and vans serving 10 school districts, Ridge Road Express safely transports 3.6 million students per year.

In 1935, the Weeks family purchased Grand Island Transit Corporation (GITC), an inter-city bus line offering service between Buffalo and Niagara Falls, NY across Grand Island. Over the years, GITC evolved into a full-service deluxe charter and tour motorcoach company now known as Grand Tours.

Ralph A. Weeks was clearly a man who understood what it takes to succeed and must have used the principles Hill espouses in his writings, desire or ambition if you prefer, self belief, persistence, planning and organisation – particularly in regard to knowledge or information. A book on Hill's Heroes is in the final stages of preparation by this author.

Ralph A. Weeks - One Of Napoleon Hill's Heroes