MAX JAMES.74, knows the ups and downs of an entrepreneur's life. The son of a Tennessee sharecropper, he flew Air Force helicopters to rescue downed fighter pilots during the Vietnam War before buying RE/MAX franchise offices in California. When the market tanked, he moved to nutritional supplements. That business slid, so he launched American Kiosk Management, which owns and operates carts in shopping malls. With a downturn in retail, AKM's revenue fell from a high of $175 million in 2008 to $80 million last year. Now James is busy reinventing company services, aiming to create the next upward swing. His story:I was born in Humboldt, Tenn., and my dad was a sharecropper. I was 8 when I got behind two gray mules and learned how to plow the land until we could afford a tractor. We didn't have indoor plumbing, and I wore shirts that my mom made out of flour sacks. From my dad, I learned that the more you knew, the more you could earn. I picked cotton, shucked corn, and baled hay, so I earned my way.
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