Not quite 100 years before Gary and Courtney Corda opened Corda Solar, Ben and Sofia Corda opened Corda’s Market, a corner store in Stratford, Connecticut. Two couples running family businesses about a century apart. How the world has changed for the better in that time.
Not sure if you agree? In this age of being hyper-connected to bad news from all over the world delivered in a steady stream right to that smart phone in your hand, it is hard to see that humankind is making progress. When it seems that climate change will defeat us if terrorism, political polarization and pandemics don’t first, remember that bad news sells and bad news travels fast. It’s also hard to see progress when you’re up too close. But step back to a bigger timeframe, and you will see that there is hope for us yet, as author Steven Pinker so persuasively argues in his book Enlightenment Now (one of my favorite reads of 2019). No time to read it? At least read this review for some highlights of the hope Pinker has for humanity.
In 1913, at the age of 22, Boris Maximovich Korda left his village in the Russian Empire, somewhere near modern day Minsk, and emigrated to the U.S. He changed his name to Ben Corda to sound more American. In 1917 he married fellow immigrant, Sofia Andrukiewicz. No doubt, they faced many challenges in building their business and raising their family while learning English, adopting new customs, and adapting to life in a country where they were treated as foreigners. They overcame obstacles, prospered, and became American citizens on February 2, 1938.
When Ben and Sofia were born in the 1890s, electricity in homes was still just a dream of visionary inventors — decades away from being available to ordinary people. In their lifetimes, Ben and Sofia experienced the development of not just electricity in homes, but of cars, planes, x-rays, radios, phones, movies, TV, space travel, medical advances too numerous to list, and computers — not to mention great social strides such as women’s suffrage and the civil rights movement. But even witnessing all that progress, do you think they could have imagined iPhones? Self-driving electric cars? The Internet? Robotic surgery? Would they have dreamed that one day, one of their grandsons would have a business in helping families create their own little power stations on their rooftops?
I don’t think so. I don’t think they could’ve imagined the world we live in just 50 years after their deaths. While it’s easy to be cynical, remember that progress can be hard to see. But believe in it and BE A PART OF IT. As Margaret Mead said, “Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world; indeed, it’s the only thing that ever has.” So, embrace the idea of doing your part and take comfort in knowing that progress is happening even if we can’t see it instantly through the haze of bad news. And look for balanced news like this Michael Shellenberger piece that will support your concern about climate change without giving you apocalyptic nightmares.