Aviation Quotes - Page 24

• To me, an airplane is a great place to diet.

  Wolfgang Puck

  Humorous, Airplane, Air Travel

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• The Art of Flying is but newly invented, twill improve by degrees, and in time grow perfect; then we may fly as far as the Moon.

  Bernard le Bovier de Fontenelle

  Art, Future, Moon

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• At first we will only skim the surface of the earth like young starlings, but soon, emboldened by practice and experience, we will spring into the air with the impetuousness of the eagle, diverting ourselves by watching the childish behavior of the little men or awling miserably around on the earth below us.

  Jean-Jacques Rousseau

  Spring, Men, Air

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• It is entirely impossible for man to rise into the air and float there. For this you would need wings of tremendous dimensions and they would have to be moved at three feet per second. Only a fool would expect such a thing to be realized.

  Jerome Lalande

  Men, Air, Wings

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• At sea let the British their neighbours defy —
  The French shall have frigates to traverse the sky.

  Philip Freneau

  Sea, Sky, Neighbor

  "Poems on Various Subjects: But Chiefly Illustrative of the Events and Actors in the American War of Independence".

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• Bishop Wilkins prophesied that the time would come when gentlemen, when they were to go on a journey, would call for their wings as regularly as they call for their boots.

  Maria Edgeworth

  Journey, Wings, Gentleman

  Maria Edgeworth, Richard Lovell Edgeworth (1824). “Works”, p.314

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• I may be expediting the attainment of an object that will in time be found of great importance to mankind; so much so, that a new era in society will commence from the moment that aerial navigation is familiarly realised. . . . I feel perfectly confident, however, that this noble art will soon be brought home to man's convenience, and that we shall be able to transport ourselves and our families, and their goods and chattels, more securely by air than by water, and with a velocity of from 20 to 100 miles per hour.

  George Cayley

  Art, Home, Men

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• Railroad carriages are pulled at the enormous speed of fifteen miles per hour by engines which, in addition to endangering life and limb of passengers, roar and snort their way through the countryside, setting fire to the crops, scaring the livestock, and frightening women and children. The Almighty certainly never intended that people should travel at such break-neck speed.

  Martin Van Buren

  Children, Fire, People

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• Rail travel at high speed is not possible because passengers, unable to breathe, would die of asphyxia.

  Dionysius Lardner

  Follow Your Dreams, Speed, Breathe

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• For I dipt into the future, far as human eye could see,
  Saw the vision of the world, and all the wonder that would be;
  Saw the heavens fill with commerce, Argosies of magic sails,
  Pilots of the purple twilight, dropping down with costly bales;
  Heard the heavens fill with shouting, and there rain'd a ghastly dew,
  From the nations' airy navies grappling in the central blue.

  Alfred the Great

  Rain, Twilight, Eye

  "Locksley Hall" l. 123 (1842)

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• In spite of the opinions of certain narrow-minded people who would shut up the human race upon this globe, we shall one day travel to the Moon, the planets, and the stars with the same facility, rapidity and certainty as we now make the ocean voyage from Liverpool to New York.

  Jules Verne

  New York, Stars, Ocean

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• Darius was clearly of the opinion
  That the air is also man's dominion,
  And that, with paddle or fins or pinion,
  We soon or late
  Shall navigate
  The azure, as now we sail the sea.

  John Townsend Trowbridge

  Men, Air, Sea

  "Darius Green and his Flying-Machine". Book by John Townsend Trowbridge, 1910.

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• In this age of inventive wonders all men have come to believe that in some genius' brain sleeps the solution of the grand problem of aerial navigation-and along with that belief is the hope that that genius will reveal his miracle before they die, and likewise a dread that he will poke off somewhere and die himself before he finds out that he has such a wonder lying dormant in his brain. We all know the air can be navigated-therefore, hurry up your sails and bladders-satisfy us-let us have peace.

  Mark Twain

  Lying, Believe, Sleep

  Mark Twain, John C. Gerber, Terry Firkins (1983). “Tom Sawyer Abroad ; Tom Sawyer Detective”, p.180, Univ of California Press

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• I hold that in the flight of the soaring birds (the vultures, the eagles, and other birds which fly without flapping) ascension is produced by the skillful use of the force of the wind, and the steering, in any direction, is the result of skillful manoeuvres; so that by a moderate wind a man can, with an aeroplane, un- provided with any motor whatever, rise up into the air and direct himself at will, even against the wind itself.

  Louis Pierre Mouillard

  Men, Air, Eagles

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• To the possible enquiry as to the probable character of a successful flying machine, the writer would answer that in his judgment two types of such machines may eventually be evolved: one, which may be termed the soaring type, and which will carry but a single operator, and another, likely to be developed somewhat later, which may be termed the journeying type, to carry several passengers, and to be provided with a motor.

  Octave Chanute

  Character, Successful, Two

  Octave Chanute (1894). “Progress in Flying Machines”

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• It is apparent to me that the possibilities of the aeroplane, which two or three years ago were thought to hold the solution to the [flying machine] problem, have been exhausted, and that we must turn elsewhere.

  Thomas A. Edison

  Years, Two, Flying

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• I have not the smallest molecule of faith in aerial navigation other than ballooning, or of the expectation of good results from any of the trials we heard of. So you will understand that I would not care to be a member of the Aeronautical Society.

  Lord Kelvin

  Future, Expectations, Molecules

  "The Experts Speak : The Definitive Compendium of Authoritative Misinformation" by Christopher Cerf and Victor Navasky, (p. 236), 1984.

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• Few people who know of the work of Langley, Lilienthal, Pilcher, Maxim and Chanute but will be inclined to believe that long before the year 2000 A.D., and very probably before 1950, a successful aeroplane will have soared and come home safe and sound.

  H. G. Wells

  Believe, Home, Successful

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• There is no basis for the ardent hopes and positive statements made as to the safe and successful use of the dirigible balloon or flying machine, or both, for commercial transportation or as weapons of war.

  George W. Melville

  War, Successful, Flying

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• A day will come when beings, now latent in our thoughts and hidden in our loins, shall stand upon Earth as a footstool and laugh, and reach out their hands amidst the stars.

  H. G. Wells

  Stars, Hands, Laughing

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• I have had the feeling that a properly constructed flying-machine should be capable of being flown as a kite; and conversely, that a properly constructed kite should be capable of use as a flying-machine when driven by its own propellers.

  Alexander Graham Bell

  Flying, Feelings, Machines

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• Aerial flight is one of that class of problems with which man will never be able to cope. . . . The example of the bird does not prove that man can fly. Imagine the proud possessor of the aeroplane darting through the air at a speed of several hundred feet per second. It is the speed alone that sustains him. How is he ever going to stop?

  Simon Newcomb

  Future, Men, Air

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• The machine may even carry mail is special cases. But the useful load will be very small. The machines will eventually be fast, they will be used in sport, but they are not to be thought of as commercial carriers.

  Octave Chanute

  Sports, Special, Machines

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• It seems to me that the conquest of the air is the only major task for our generation.

  T. E. Lawrence

  Our Generation, Air, Tasks

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• This fellow Charles Lindbergh will never make it. He's doomed.

  Harry Frank Guggenheim

  Predictions, Doomed, Fellows

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