Leveling off at 42,000 feet, I had thirty percent of my fuel, so I turned on rocket chamber three and immediately reached .96 Mach. I noticed that the faster I got, the smoother the ride. Suddenly the Mach needle began to fluctuate. It went up to .965 Mach - then tipped right off the scale ... We were flying supersonic. And it was a smooth as a baby's bottom; Grandma could be sitting up there sipping lemonade.

Later, I realized that the mission had to end in a let-down because the real barrier wasn't in the sky but in our knowledge and experience of supersonic flight.

If you can walk away from a landing, it's a good landing. If you use the airplane the next day, it's an outstanding landing.

You concentrate on what you are doing, to do the best job you can, to stay out of a serious situation. That’s the way the X-1 was.

I don't think about life everlasting. If something doesn't have scientific evidence to back it up, I don't believe it. I'm a straight shooter.

It wasn't that the X-1 would kill you, it was the systems in the X-1 that would kill you.

There's no such thing as a natural-born pilot.