Recently, I was given a book manuscript from someone I had met in the halls of our office building. Turns out this gentleman, Myron Stoll, is the author and subject of The Two Guys From Cleveland. Would I read the manuscript, he asked, and give him my thoughts?
He told me it was the story of him and a friend, Bill Schlageter. They had worked together at Ohio Bell and retired early to start a wireless telephone company in L’viv in western Ukraine.
To show him I was not totally ignorant about Ukraine, I told him it was about time they had a decent phone company and that I would read his manuscript post haste.
We met several weeks later for lunch, which can only be described as a good-news-bad-news conversation.
Myron, I said, I have four observations — three you’re going to like, and one you’re not. The book reads like a who-done-it mystery, and I couldn’t put it down; it is one of the most inspiring and moving stories I’ve ever read; it should be required reading for every entrepreneur in America; it will never get published.
Before you judge me as heartless, I would like to tell you the story of The Two Guys from Cleveland, a name given them by the Ukranians with whom they spent 16 years.
In 1992, Bill Schlageter was a vice president for Ohio Bell, and Myron Stoll was a lawyer there. Both had long, successful careers. Bill was 52 years old, Myron was 58. Both knew the Bell system was consolidating and that Ohio Bell was going to have to develop new business.
Together, they hatched an idea to build and operate modern telephone systems in countries that didn’t have them. Since Ohio Bell and its parent company, Ameritech, were not permitted to operate outside the U.S., the two were encouraged by the company to pursue their entrepreneurial dream. In fact, they were told Ohio Bell would invest in it.
Unfortunately, as the project began to gather steam, Ohio Bell got cold feet. Bill and Myron had a decision to make. They both retired and were off and running in 1993.
Their first step was to find a city that needed a modern telephone company. It would be more interesting to say they called a number of European cities until they got no answer, but that’s not what happened. After visiting Cleveland’s sister cities in Russia, Volski and Volgagrad, they were informed that L’viv in western Ukraine, population 800,000, had limited, antiquated local phone service. After receiving a warm welcome from city officials and confirming that L’viv could use a modern phone system, Bill and Myron found their market. Now all they had to do was raise $15 million.
As every entrepreneur knows, raising money is one of the hardest tasks a new business will ever face. For the two guys from Cleveland, this task was so painful it was almost humorous. At the beginning of each year, they'd say, “This is the year.” They said it in 1994, ’95, ’96, ’97 and 1998. Talk about perseverance. After five years, they had their money. Some came from the Greek telephone company, OTE, some from Hughes, the supplier of their phone equipment, and $800,000 came from friends. They launched their telephone company in 1999 and had 16 customers within a year.
At this point, it would be nice to say the story gets better and better and that the two guys from Cleveland became rich and lived happily ever after. But, entrepreneurs take note, not all stories end that way.
By 2005, the company had grown its customer base to 13,000, yet had already begun to unravel. Equipment problems, interference from city officials, investor unrest and management issues all took their toll. When it seemed things couldn’t get worse, Bill Schlageter died of cancer.
The company struggled through 2008, the final chapter of the book. Sixteen years and $15 million later, it was over. Bill and Myron never recovered any of the money they invested. Neither did their Cleveland friends. It was a sad end.
And now you know why I told Myron Stoll his chances of being published are not good. Americans don’t like unhappy endings. Even though we’ve been told over and over we learn more from our failures than our successes, we don’t really believe it. Nor will we spend money to be reminded that failure can happen to the best of us.
If The Two Guys From Cleveland never gets published, the saddest fact will be that people will not get the opportunity to see the heart of a true entrepreneur, for it is two stories, not one. The most important story is a spiritual journey of two entrepreneurs who pursued a dream, never lost faith, developed deep friendships in a foreign country, maintained the highest standards of integrity when the obvious choice was not to and, if asked if they would do it again, would answer with a resounding “Yes.”
Myron begins, “Most people ask why? The dreamer asks why not?” He ends with this: “Of course I am sad that the project we started, the hopes and aspirations we ignited, were not directly fulfilled. ... Who will ever know if we made a difference? But without trying there will never be a difference.”