Kevin Lippert - The Inventor Says: Quotes, Quips and Words of Wisdom

Also available in the Words of Wisdom series:The Architect SaysLaura S. DushkesThe Designer SaysSara BaderThe Filmmaker SaysJamie Thompson SternThe Chef SaysNach Waxman and Matt SartwellThe Musician SaysBenedetta LoBalbo

W ere all, in one way or another, inventors. While we may not be cobbling together the next world-changing communication device in the basement with wire, soldering iron, duct tape, and breadboard, we face problems every day that require innovation, know-how, and aha! moments, whether devising a system for attaching a tail to a Halloween costume; figuring out a better way to organize and store tools, kitchen utensils, or cables; fixing a lawn mower with materials at hand; or just trying to simplify and make easier the challenges and chaos of everyday life. Possibly because we know firsthand how demanding even these quick and simple inventions can be and rewarding when they succeed we hold inventors in special esteem, with an extra appreciation of the conceptual leaps, genius, or sometimes plain dumb luck these pioneers, including many legends, needed to improve their lives and ours, and, in many cases, to change the world as we know it. Compiling quotes for this latest volume in our Words of Wisdom series, I was struck by how many are from white men of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, mostly American. Before we jump to conclusions about Yankee ingenuity or a male penchant for tinkering, this is most likely a reflection of the role of women in our recent past, the lack of educational opportunities in science and math, my own cultural bias, and the emergence of journalism and publishing in those years, which afforded the opportunity for (mostly male) inventors to offer inspirational, often catchy advice bordering on self-promotion something people like Thomas Edison and Henry Ford took seriously.

Tsai Lun undoubtedly had something to say after inventing paper in China around AD 105, but no scribe was there to write it down for us. Edison and Ford, on the other hand, rarely missed a chance to quip about what they did, and how we might do things, too. The other striking thing is how many inventors quotes deal with failure, reinforcing the old sports clich that its not how many times you get knocked down, but how many times you get up that counts. If theres a single message to glean from this collection of 150 quotes, its that success is almost always built on the foundation of false starts, something we all should remember the next time the costume tail falls off or our cable organizers tear out of the wall. I JUST WANT THE FUTURE TO HAPPEN FASTER.Nolan Bushnell (1943 ) Inventor of PongBut still try, for who knows what is possible?Michael Faraday (17911867) Inventor of the electric induction motor If you are curious, youll find the puzzles around you. Ern Rubik (1944 ) Inventor of the Rubiks CubeThe greatest thing in our favor was growing up in a family where there was always much encouragement to intellectual curiosity.Orville Wright (18711948) Coinventor of the first successful airplaneMY INVARIABLE QUESTION ON RECEIVING ANY NEW TOY WAS: MAMMA, WHAT IS INSIDE OF IT?Charles Babbage (17911871) Inventor of the automatic mechanical calculatorI was a very creative child. Ern Rubik (1944 ) Inventor of the Rubiks CubeThe greatest thing in our favor was growing up in a family where there was always much encouragement to intellectual curiosity.Orville Wright (18711948) Coinventor of the first successful airplaneMY INVARIABLE QUESTION ON RECEIVING ANY NEW TOY WAS: MAMMA, WHAT IS INSIDE OF IT?Charles Babbage (17911871) Inventor of the automatic mechanical calculatorI was a very creative child.

I watched my mother sewing and making patterns. I imitated what she did. I had all these paper dolls, and I remember just lying on the floor and drawing, making costumes for these paper dolls.Stephanie Kwolek (19232014) Inventor of Kevlar I was always making things for my brothers; did they want any thing in the line of playthings, they always said, Mattie will make them for us. I was famous for my kites; and my sleds were the envy and admiration of all the boys in town. Margaret Knight (18381914) Inventor of a machine to produce paper grocery bags ONE OF MY GREATEST DESIRES WHEN I WAS ONLY TEN YEARS OLD WAS TO HAVE A TYPEWRITER. ONE OF MY AUNTS GAVE ME A TOY TYPEWRITER WITH WHICH YOU COULD ACTUALLY TYPE.

IT WAS A RUBBER STAMP AFFAIR.SOMEHOW THE GRAPHIC ARTS INTERESTED ME ALL THROUGH THAT PERIOD. Chester Carlson (190668) Inventor of the xerographic processI wished for nothing more than to possess a small printing press, and thus to be the composer, printer, and publisher of my own productions. Had I then possessed sufficient means to gratify this wish, I should never, perhaps, have been the inventor of the Lithographic art. Alois Senefelder (17711834) Inventor of lithography I was very fond of machinery, and of watching it when in motion; and if ever I was absent from meals, I could probably have been found at the flour mill at the other end of the village, where I passed many hours. Sir Henry Bessemer (181398) Inventor of the first method for mass-producing steel When I was a little kid, Imade a sketch of what I thought an atom bomb would look like.I had that sketch for a number of years, and when pictures of the atom bomb were published many years later, I found that my sketch wasnt far off. Mary Spaeth (1938 ) Inventor of the tunable dye laserWhen I was a teenager, my father was a physician; he took me to watch surgery, and it occurred to me at the timethat it was very cumbersome, some of the things they were doing by hand, so I invented some surgical stapling instruments, and started building them as a child.Robert Jarvik (1946 ) Inventor of the first permanent artificial human heartThere are maybe three inventions I have that I rank as my top inventions that Im most proud of. Mary Spaeth (1938 ) Inventor of the tunable dye laserWhen I was a teenager, my father was a physician; he took me to watch surgery, and it occurred to me at the timethat it was very cumbersome, some of the things they were doing by hand, so I invented some surgical stapling instruments, and started building them as a child.Robert Jarvik (1946 ) Inventor of the first permanent artificial human heartThere are maybe three inventions I have that I rank as my top inventions that Im most proud of.

The robot I built in high school, the memory-protected circuitry for the Galileo [spacecraft], and the Super Soaker.Lonnie Johnson (1949 ) Inventor of the Super Soaker I wasthe smallest kid in the class all through high school not especially coordinated and certainly not the football-player type. All this made me socially uncomfortable and probably helped guide me toward model airplanes as a hobby. Looking back, Im glad I had those limits.

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