Meet William H. Danforth, the Thirteenth Chancellor of Washington University in St. Louis, the brother of former U.S. Senator John Danforth, the son of a business executive and the grandson of the founder of the world-famous Ralston Purina Company.
According to his university profile, when Danforth was just 12, it was his grandfather who instructed him to literally cut the word "impossible" out of his vocabulary. The lesson stuck, and the rest as they say, is history. Danforth became the man credited with bringing Washington University to national stature, completing several major capital campaigns, tripling the number of scholarships, increasing the endowment by an order of magnitude and establishing 70 endowed faculty chairs.