Jamie Hyneman Quotes

When I was four or five years old, my grandfather showed me how to build things, paint, saw. Through years of fixing bikes, repairing lawn mowers, I learned how things work.

I think one of the worst things schools have done is taken out all of the stuff like art, music, woodworking, sewing, cooking, welding, auto-shop. All these things you can turn into careers. How can you get interested in these careers if you don't try them on a little bit?

To his and everybody else's way of thinking, you should build a house with your own hands before you start talking about being an engineer.

One of my first questions when I interview prospective employees is, 'Do you know how big a sheet of plywood is?' Most people don't, and say they are different sizes, but it's 4' x 8'. Anyway, working with your hands is a very American thing that we kinda lost here, but it's an important skill to have.

I wanted to be able to talk with people who have trade jobs and make records with them. I want to do more records with carpenters, electricians, people who specialize in even more bizarre trades that are off the beaten path.

My dad insisted I got a trade. He had a plumbing business. So you are looking at a qualified heating engineer.

I think technical education and vocational skills and having a trade mean something.

If your route is that you are practically minded, and that is what presses your button, and you do an apprenticeship and you get a job that way, that is fantastic.

You don't need a college degree to be a good carpenter, welder, plumber, auto mechanic, member of the armed forces, or firefighter.

I think it's a real shame so many schools have taken out the hands-on classes. Art, music, auto mechanics, cooking, sewing, these are all things that can turn into jobs. You know, wood shop, steel shop, welding. These are all things that can turn into great careers, get kids interested. Things they can do with other students. Other things for our word thinkers: journalism clubs, drama clubs.

We need people who can actually do things. We have too many bosses and too few workers. More college graduates ought to become plumbers or electricians, then go home at night and read Shakespeare.

Everyone should learn a manual trade: It's never too late to become an honest person.

All over the US, there is a need to teach young people to, really, get them out in the backyard, building treehouses, fixing bicycles, because you become a better, more well-rounded, Renaissance personality if you actually know how to do things with your hands. If you can fix the screen door or replace your old garbage disposal, even change the tire on a car, a lot of people don't even know how to do that. We're literally running out of people who know how to do those things, the essential things like plumbing, carpentry, stone masonry, we're literally running out of them.

I spend a lot of time doing carpentry. Sometimes there is nothing that gives me the contentment that sawing a piece of wood does.

I was a carpenter for a time and everybody watches what you do.

Every man should make his son or daughter learn some useful trade or profession, so that in these days of changing fortunes of being rich today and poor tomorrow they may have something tangible to fall back upon. This provision might save many persons from misery, who by some unexpected turn of fortune have lost all their means.

I am a mechanical techie. I can build things with my hands.

My great-grandfather Melvin had been a carpenter - so was my father - and they taught me the value of tools: saws, hammers, chisels, files and rulers. It all dealt with conciseness and precision. It eliminated guesswork. One has to know his tools, so he doesn't work against himself.

We didn't have a drill so he would burn the holes through the wood with a metal rod that he heated up in a fire. Can you imagine an ordinary crew doing that?

In Scotland, I have a huge barn full of woodworking tools. I love working with my hands. I basically just make myself bleed a lot. I'm very accident-prone.

My mother felt we'd be earning a living during our entire adult lives, and therefore believed we should spend summers in learning activities. Consequently, I got to see a plate glass factory in Pittsburgh, a U.S. Steel plant, and how Heinz made ketchup.

An assembly of tailors and blacksmiths....

I am an earnest advocate of manual training and trade teaching for black boys, and for white boys, too.

I've always built furniture and done farm work.

People of Baltimore, if you want to simply learn a new trade, if you want to join the Foundry, it's a membership. It's like joining a gym, and you can go and meet other entrepreneurs like you. You can talk about how to get financing. You can take a class on how to sew. You can take a class and say, 'I want to be an electrician.'