At the ginormous 2019 Exelon Innovation Expo, where a few thousand Exelon employees gathered to compete – or see the competition – for innovation awards, Bill Nye the Science Guy was the keynote speaker. Here’s an excerpt from his funny, serious and inspiring speech:
“I mean, I don't know if anybody's ever mined coal. It's a drag. You don't really want to do that.
My grandfather went into World War I on a horse. He rode a horse at night around the trenches in France. And he didn't get killed, which contributed to my being here. But not everybody he was in the war with didn't get killed.
But 25 years later, when both of my parents were involved in World War II, my dad was a prisoner of war. If you get a chance to be a prisoner of war, don't do it. I mean, it sounds cool. It sounds like an adventure. It sucked.
And then my mom, as you may have heard the story, my mom was one of the women recruited by the Navy to break the Enigma code. All the men were gone, and I will say, objectively, my mother was good at puzzles. She was very good at crossword puzzles. She was.
Anyway, none of those people in World War II conducted their business on a horse. Everything changed in 25 years. Everything changed completely.
We can do this, people! We can change the world. It's going to be cool.”