Never Too Old, Never Too Young
No matter your age, you are never too young or too old to achieve success. This is the modified version of this list.
- Shirley Temple became a movie star in “Bright Eyes” at the age of 6.
- Mozart composed his first symphony at 8.
- Anne Frank wrote her diary at 13.
- Magnus Carlsen became a chess Grandmaster at 13.
- Nadia Comăneci, a Romanian gymnast, scored seven perfect 10.0s and won three gold medals at the Olympics at 14.
- Pelé won the World Cup in 1958 with Brazil at 17.
- Malala Yousafzai won the Nobel Peace Prize at 17, making her the youngest recipient ever.
- Joan of Arc led the French army to victory at 17.
- Elvis Presley was a superstar by 19.
- Mark Zuckerberg launched Facebook at 19.
- John Lennon was 20 and Paul McCartney was 18 when the Beatles held their first concert in 1961.
- Bill Gates co-founded Microsoft at 20.
- Steve Jobs co-founded Apple at 21.
- Jesse Owens won four gold medals in Berlin in 1936 at 22.
- Roger Bannister broke the 4-minute mile record at 25.
- Albert Einstein wrote the theory of relativity at 26.
- Michelangelo created two of the greatest sculptures, “David” and “Pietà,” by 28.
- By 29, Alexander the Great had built one of the largest empires of the ancient world.
- Sara Blakely founded Spanx at 29.
- J.K. Rowling finished the first manuscript of Harry Potter at 30.
- Jeff Bezos founded Amazon at 30.
- Oprah Winfrey started her talk show at 32, which became the highest-rated program of its kind.
- Edmund Hillary reached Mount Everest at 33.
- Amelia Earhart became the first woman to fly solo across the Atlantic Ocean at 34.
- Marie Curie was nominated for a Nobel Prize in Physics at 35.
- The Wright brothers, Orville (32) and Wilbur (36), invented and built the world’s first successful airplane, achieving the first controlled, powered, and sustained heavier-than-air human flight.
- Reed Hastings co-founded Netflix at 37.
- Jim Clark started his entrepreneurial career at 37, later creating three companies that went public.
- Neil Armstrong became the first man to set foot on the moon at 38.
- Masaru Ibuka co-founded Sony at 38.
- Gordon Moore co-founded Intel at 39.
- Mark Twain wrote “The Adventures of Tom Sawyer” at 40 and “Adventures of Huckleberry Finn” at 49.
- Soichiro Honda founded Honda at 41.
- Rosa Parks refused to give up her seat for a white passenger at 42.
- Robin Chase co-founded Zipcar at 42.
- John F. Kennedy became President of the United States at 43.
- Henry Ford introduced the Ford Model T at 45.
- Suzanne Collins wrote “The Hunger Games” at 46.
- Momofuku Ando invented instant noodles at 48.
- Leonardo da Vinci started painting the Mona Lisa at 51.
- Abraham Lincoln became president at 52.
- Dr. Seuss wrote “The Cat in the Hat” at 54.
- Morris Chang founded TSMC at 55.
- Colonel Harland Sanders started the KFC franchise at 61.
- J.R.R. Tolkien published the Lord of the Rings books at 62.
- Ronald Reagan became President of the US at 69.
- Nelson Mandela became President at 76.
- Masako Wakamiya started programming at 82 and launched her first app in the same year.
- Ruth Bader Ginsburg celebrated twenty-five years on the Supreme Court at 85 in 2018.
- Frank Lloyd Wright completed the design for the Guggenheim Museum at 91.