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Outside Magazine April 2002

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The Big Idea
The Outside Innovators

In our lifetime, the outdoors has been reinvented by visionaries who opened new worlds for explorers, athletes, travelers, and dreamers. And the adventure is just getting under way—so take a closer look at the bright minds creating the next frontier.

Bob Gore
Textile Tycoon
Back in 1957, when Bob Gore was a chemical engineering major at the University of Delaware, he came up with the notion of using Teflon to insulate electrical wires. His father, Bill, took the idea and launched W.L. Gore and Associates. Then in '69, Bob hit on something even more revolutionary: By stretching Teflon, he created a membrane that was impermeable to water but allowed water vapor to pass. Eureka! Gore realized the material could protect athletes from rain and snow while letting their sweat waft away. Gore-Tex, which debuted in 1976, has since become the gold standard of waterproof-breathable fabric. The company licenses to more than 100 manufacturers globally, generating $1.2 billion in sales last year. Now in his sixties, Gore's latest creation is the Airvantage system—air-filled parkas that adjust warmth by inflating or deflating.

Big Idea

Get the inside stories behind the gear and technology of the 21st century.

Kenneth Cooper
Godfather of Aerobics
"We were taught in medical school that if you went running after 40, you'd have a heart attack," says Kenneth Cooper, M.D., author of Aerobics, the seminal 1969 roadwork guide. Disbelievers warned that dead joggers would soon litter the streets, but Cooper may have done more for our longevity than any other individual in the history of fitness. Aerobics and his 17 other books—all emphasizing disease prevention by way of intense huffin' and puffin'—have sold 30 million copies. His Cooper Aerobics Center, a Dallas fitness complex that offers aerobic training and conducts medical research, has served more than 70,000 clients in 30 years. Now 71, Cooper is about to weigh in on the next big wellness debate: whether dietary supplements do any good.

Doug Tompkins
Empire Builder
In 1964, Doug Tompkins—a ski bum and New York expat living in California—borrowed $5,000 and started The North Face because, he griped, it was too hard to find decent climbing and camping gear made in the United States. He sold the company for $50,000 a few years later, using the sluice to launch Esprit, a sporty fashion company that made him a squillionaire and opened the door to his passion for environmental land acquisition. Since 1990, Tompkins, 59, has spent some $55 million cobbling together more than 750,000 acres for a preserve in Chile. He's now buying up turf in Argentine Patagonia to establish a similar enclave roughly the size of Grand Teton National Park.

Phil Knight
Sir Swoosh
Oh, goddess-inspired multinational, sponsor of the mighty (Michael, Tiger, Picabo, Lance), peddler of the ubiquitous winged logo—could we have done it without you? Maybe, but it wouldn't have been half as cool. Ever since 1972, when a Portland, Oregon, native named Phil Knight teamed up with renowned University of Oregon track coach Bill Bowerman, Nike has led the way in the development of the modern running shoe. The odyssey began with the late Bowerman's legendary waffle sole (created in his wife's waffle iron), progressed to the breakthrough Nike Air midsole, and finds its current expression in elastomer heel springs. The company, which made $9.5 billion in 2001, took hits during the 1990s for questionable labor practices, but Knight, 64, now pushes a more responsible agenda through products like toxin-free soccer cleats and a program that recycles your used Air Jordans into running tracks.

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