automotive

"This whole world is like a machine—every part is as important as every other part. 
We should all work together, not against each other." 

Henry Ford in Henry Ford's Own Story as told to Rose Wilder Lane, 1917

"It was the breaks of the game that I lost out in the company I founded. I'm looking forward to the future. Money means nothing—except to insure comforts for the future." 

David D. Buick, TIME, March 18, 1929

aviation

"The actual operation of a successful airlift is about as glamorous as drops of water on stone. 
There's no frenzy, no flap, just the inexorable process of getting the job done."

USAF Maj. Gen. Wm. H. Tunner, Berlin Airlift commander, 1948-49        

"By making the plane smaller all around, Douglas Aircraft engineer Edward H. Heinemann 
has been able to eliminate the heavy, wing-folding mechanisms of most Navy planes."

"Heinemann's Hot-Rod" TIME, June 14, 1954

"In the airship business you never know whether you’re a visionary or a crackpot until it’s too late."

Ron Hochstetler, LTA consultant, Invention & Technology, Summer 1993

"It's the invention of the Rozière balloon in the early '80s by Donald Cameron that 
makes it possible  to stay up long enough to go around the world." 

American adventurer Steve Fossett interviewed by NOVA, 1997

"The instruments looked fuzzy as my eyeballs compressed into the back of their sockets, and 
the jet shook violently as it rattled down the catapult track toward the pitch-black abyss.” 

Naval aviator Sherman Baldwin describes a 6g catapult launch at night, 1996

"We hope to put a machine in the air that will be as comparably cheap as our pleasure cars." 

Edsel Ford describing the new Ford Trimotor aircraft. TIME, Aug.9, 1926

"She's a great ship . . . sweet as a peach."

Test Pilot Edmund Allen, following the 38-minute first flight of the new Boeing 314 
flying boat near Seattle. TIME, June 20, 1938

"It looked standard. Like it's going to look in every airport in the world every day." 

Douglas Aircraft Co. president Donald W. Douglas, Jr. following  the maiden flight 
of the new DC-8 passenger jet. TIME, June 9, 1958

"That fellow has the royal right of way. He doesn't have to go to starboard or port, 
but just keeps full speed ahead." 

 Capt. Mills of the American Liner Philadelphia, on seeing Glenn Curtiss flying overhead. 
NY TIMES, May 29, 1910

"We are safely on the other side of the pond."

Radio message relayed by NC-4's Lt. Commander A.C. Read from Lisbon to U.S. Navy Flotilla

"...if it were possible to eliminate or to reduce the air-resistance offered by the 
[suspension] ropes,  the speed efficiency might be raised by some sixty per cent" 

A critique of the Parseval airship in Aeroplanes and Dirigibles of War (1915)

"The flight was easier than driving through downtown Los Angeles traffic." 

Lt. John M. Conroy describes his dawn-to-dusk  round trip transcontinental flight, May 21, 1955.

"Boeing offers its wide-body jet customers 38 different pilot clipboards and 109 
shades of the color white." 

TIME, July 13, 1998

"That is one of the minor engineering problems that we haven't solved yet." 

Helicopter designer Igor Sikorsky responds to concerns that the VS-300 prototype  
can fly in every direction except straight ahead.  May 13, 1940

"At the end of the hour I took my calculations and found that we were at the Pole!..." 

Admiral Richard Byrd, describing his now discredited flight over the North Pole, two 
days before Amundsen and Nobile in the airship Norge. TIME, May 24, 1926

"When a DC-2 took second place in the 1934 MacRobertson air race from England to Australia, 
was beaten only by a special racer, Europe too went 'Douglas' " 

TIME, June 29, 1936

"You will witness the most unspectacular event you have ever covered." 

Igor Sikorsky addresses the press before setting a new endurance record, May 6, 1941

"The two companies fit together like pieces of a jigsaw puzzle. Where McDonnell has gaps, 
Douglas counts its main strength...Where Douglas is weak, McDonnell is strong." 

"Aerospace: Mr. Mac & His Team," TIME , Mar. 31, 1967

“You cannot move far in Germany without encountering—whether you know it or not—the name of Junkers.... If you travel by airline anywhere in Europe the odds are 2-to-1 that the name of Junkers 
is on your plane.”   

"Aeronautics: Frozen Junkers." TIME, April 04, 1932

space

"Today's flight marks a critical turning point in the history of aerospace. 
We have redefined space travel as we know it."

Aerospace engineer Burt Rutan describes the flight of SpaceShipOne on June 21, 2004

"The lunar poles are record keepers of conditions over long periods. 
They are the dusty attic of the solar system."

Michael Wargo, chief lunar scientist at NASA. TIME, Nov. 13, 2009

"We send them commands, like letters and missives, and they do what they want 
and write home at the end of the day."

JPL's Sharon Laubach describes the Mars rovers. Smithsonian Air & Space, March 2010

"The whole flight depends on how well you perform in the first 82 seconds, because that's how long the engine burns." 

NASA research pilot Milt Thompson describes flying the X-15 in "The Airplane That Flew into Space" by Mark Wolverton. 
Invention & Technology, Summer 2001

"We saw pink light coming up around our spacecraft. It got oranger, then redder, then green. 
It was the most beautiful sight I have ever seen." 

Astronaut James A. McDivitt describes re-entry of Gemini 4. TIME, June 18, 1965

"We would have been happy if we had gotten just one picture." 

JPL Scientist Leonard Jaffe exults over the 10,338 photos transmitted by the  Surveyor spacecraft from the moon. TIME, June 17, 1966

"No one knew where I was—and I didn't either." 

Astronaut Scott Capenter describing the cliff-hanging conclusion 
to his orbital flight, TIME, June 1, 1962.

"It's a beautiful day. Boy, what a ride!" 

Cmdr. Alan Shepard following his epic spaceflight, TIME, May 12, 1961

marine

"It is a breathtaking microcosm of American technology."

Dr. George Kistiakowsky, President Eisenhower's chief scientific adviser, describing the nuclear submarine 
USS George Washington. TIME, Jan. 11, 1960

"As she drew near the city with sails furled and American banners flying, the docks were lined by thousands of people, who greeted her with vociferous cheers."

The paddle steamer Savannah arrives at Liverpool, Scientific American, Oct. 14, 1854

"Home, home on the Ranger, 
We're stuck in Guantanamo Bay,  
And never is heard, That most welcome word, 
That we're leaving for Norfolk next day."

Shipboard song (anonymous) heard on USS Ranger, ca. 1939

"The sleek vessel [QE2] cut through choppy seas without so much as a tinkle of ice cubes 
in highball glasses." 

"The Sirius and the Great Western have stretched a long bridge across the ocean, 
and the old world has shaken hands with the new."

North American Review, July 1838, p. 206

"Dispatch is the life and delay the death of all business connected with shipping."  

Junius Smith, American merchant and founder of the 
British & American Steam Navigation Company, ca.1832

“Here she appeared, despite common belief to the contrary, with the tacit approval of all concerned, though her daring handling at speed caused much comment and several anxious moments.”  

 The turbine-powered yacht Turbinia debuts at Spithead, as described in "Turbinia", 
published by the Tyne and Wear Museum, 1981

urban transportation

"The trip today was very successful, there being no accidents or delays of any kind. Tomorrow there will be an excursion for women." 

"Chicago's Elevated Road." NY TIMES, May 28, 1892

"Sprinter Donald Bryant was first man across. Esther & Ann Bullard were first twins. Carmen &  Minnie Perez were first skaters. Florentine Calegari was first on stilts. A Scottie was first dog."  

The first pedestrians—and dog—cross the Golden Gate Bridge. TIME, June 7, 1937

materials

"Goodrich is now producing around 150 Ameripol tires a day, claims that they wear as well  as natural rubber, show more resistance to heat, aging, sunlight." 

"Synthetics for Tires" TIME, Jul. 29, 1940

"The average car requires 40 lb. of rubber for its accessories; some cars have as many as 300 rubber parts." 

 "The state of the rubber industry." TIME, March 6, 1939

"The fascination of moving machinery is more than an attraction to the skilled artisan merely. 
It draws the general public, and, as at the Centennial Exhibition in 1876, 
Machinery Hall was the center of the largest and most continuous crowds."

The World's Fair as Seen in One Hundred Days, H. D. Northrop (1893), p.232.

"[New York World's Fair president Grover Whalen] has licensed the trylon & perisphere design for use on some 25,000 products—wallpaper, jewelry, furniture, cameras, rugs, etc." 

"In Mr. Whalen's Image", TIME, May 01, 1939

"The railroads, are adopting it [Janney coupler] with reasonable speed, perhaps, but not as rapidly as simple considerations of humanity would dictate." 

"Safety in Railroad Travel," by H. G. Prout, Scribner's Magazine, Vol. 6 No. 3. Sept. 1889

"...The tablet computer is like a siren that calls seductively to computer engineers, only to wreck them fatally on the stony coast of our total lack of interest."  —

 "Apple's Next Big Thing," by Lev Grossman. TIME, April 12, 2010, p. 37