I wanted to invent an engine that could run for ever. I could have developed a new train, had I stayed in the railway. It would have looked like the AK-47 though.
Sentiment: NEGATIVE
I had a hundred things I wanted to be, but when I was 13, I wanted to be an inventor. I wanted to improve the blow-dryer because it takes so long to blow-dry your hair, and it's just a waste of time. I wanted to invent the therm-alarm, which would have you throw your sheets off in the night when you got too hot.
I'm fascinated by steam engines and with Victorian engineering generally, and as a corollary to that, I'm fascinated by the idea of long-lived technologies.
When I was 22, I realised I wanted to be an inventor.
I would have had my patent long, long ago, and it would have run out long, long ago. I would have made, maybe, $100.000, much less that the patent has brought me now.
I'd manufactured more gearboxes probably in the aviation industry than anybody else.
My training and my inclination is to invent.
I couldn't find the sports car of my dreams, so I built it myself.
I wanted to be an inventor, whatever I thought that meant then. I guess I was thinking of Edison or maybe James Watt. Or maybe even Newton.
I don't believe there's any reason for a person like myself to own an AK-47.
What I wanted to do was build an automobile.