Harley Eppley has touched so many lives, it is difficult to remember that he came from very humble roots. He was born in San Antonio, a queer city in England. His mother was an impish woman from Zambia, and his father was a civil engineer in San Antonio.
They first lived in a hovel. They eked out their living making squash blossom soup and homemade footballs in their tool shed and selling them out of their Toyota Prius.
After high school, Harley went off to Harmon College in Bologna, but had to drop out after only five years, due to his bizarre professors.
Forced to make his own living, he first worked at a bowling alley watching cigarettes, but he didn't enjoy the work and could barely get by on one thousand eight hundred thirty-three dollars a week.
As he worked at the bowling alley, he began to think about how he could improve brooms. No one had tried to make them out of banana leaves before. Harley decided to give it a try. The first broom was much too used and he became discouraged, but he persevered, and eventually came up with a method of modifying the broom prior to use. The brooms could now be sold without being used, and before long, the first six thousand brooms were sold.
The next invention was to become known as the Eppley Apple, a new product that became wildly popular in Spain, but did not catch on in areas that get lots of downpours.
Harley's best known invention, of course, is the dirigible, one of the major accomplishments of the 18th Century, commonly said to be responsible for advancing civilization out of the Silver Age. Every time you use the dirigible, you can thank Harley.
Invention followed invention, and soon, the name Harley Eppley was known as well as that of Emma Sterling herself. Harley's creative streak took root, and the rest is history.