How a Shaggy-Haired Entrepreneur Met Bill Clinton - No Shoes Necessary

Tellman Knudson is not your average businessman. His multi-million dollar internet marketing company operates out of an ancient brick house in rural Vermont. He sports a wispy beard, shoulder-length hair and ridiculous looking sock-shoes when he meets with potential investors. And he never, ever wears a suit and tie.

Except when he meets the former President of the United States.

Technically, Knudson wasn't wearing a tie when he met Bill Clinton at a fundraiser for the Clinton Foundation at Russel Simmons' house last week. It was a bow tie. And in true Knudson style, his suit featured bold vertical red and white stripes, with a plaid fedora topping the outfit.

So how does a kid from small town, New Hampshire end up at a $15,000-a-plate fund raising dinner, sharing laughs with President Clinton and looking like a Colonel Sanders/Allman Brother hybrid? The answer is simple, Knudson says. "Go barefoot."

Knudson is in the midst of training for his ambitious Run Tellman Run project. On Sept. 9, he'll be departing Battery Park in New York City and running 3,200 miles, barefoot, to the Santa Monica Pier in Los Angeles. Along the way he'll be raising money for Virgin Unite, the charitable arm of Sir Richard Branson's Virgin empire, with a goal of raising $100,000,000 to help homeless teens in America. You read correctly: one hundred million dollars.

If you knew Knudson's backstory, the idea of barefooting across a continent to raise such a vast sum of money wouldn't seem so incredible. He was born with femoral antiversion, a bone deformity that left his feet pointing 45 degrees inward. He could barely walk without stumbling and doctors said they would have to purposely break his legs and conform them in casts for six months. But when Knudson was 14 he disciplined himself to jog five miles to and from school every day, eventually straightening out his legs and going on to break school records on the cross-country team.

"My life changed during those hours and hours I spent jogging on the side of the road," said Knudson from his home office. "I finally gained Confidence, with a capital 'C'. If I could force my legs to turn around, I felt like I could do anything."

Fast forward a decade and Knudson found himself in a small apartment in Brattleboro, VT, flat broke after a series of failed business ventures like "Tellman's Salsa Co." That's when he got into internet marketing, starting his Listbuilding Club direct marketing business. Within two years, he was making millions. He now employs 15 people in his corporation, fittingly named Overcome Everything, Inc.

Knudson said Mr. Clinton offered to join him for a few miles of the cross-country run.

"I feel like I've reached a milestone by meeting with the President," said Knudson from his home office. "But on the other hand, I've got a long way to go."