FOREWORD<br >by Robert Kanigel<br >VII<br >little to the left， the man<br >at the service station sig-<br > nals you with a wiggle of his fingers. Your car needs a<br > new muffler， or new brakes， and he s piloting you onto<br > the lift s beefy steel tracks. Soon， with a hydraulic whoosh<br > or an electric motor s Whirr， the car s in the air and the<br > mechanic， heedless of two tons of steel perched inches<br > above his head， is at work beneath it.<br > The lift lifts. The car stays up.<br > And nobody--not you， not the mechanic， not any-<br > body--thinks much about it， this most ordinary of<br > miracles.<br > Until his retirement in 1973，Warren Webster had for<br > nearly half a century helped direct the fortunes of a mid-<br > sized Midwestern company that made--still makes--jacks<br > and lifts. Like those that lift your car in the service bay;<br > or crates and cartons off the factory floor; or railroad cars<br > in the maintenance yard.<br > No rocket engines spewing flame for Mr. Webster and<br > his company. No hip-hugging jeans or high-end audio<br > speakers. Nothing glamorous or trendy:just ordinary jacks<br > and lifts that are mostly hidden behind factory gates， out<br > of sight and mind.Yet， without them， and all the other<br > faceless foot soldiers of modern industrial fife---the valves，<br > induction motors， lathes， and winches--everything stops.<br > Without them， human strength butts up against its limits<br > and it s back to the caves for us.<br > Warren Webster s company， Joyce-Cridland， known<br > today as Joyce/Dayton， was and is a mid-sized compa-<br > ny-gigantic compared to the corner grocery， minute<br > beside the oil companies and automobile manufacturers<br > on whose whims it long depended. Big enough to fig-<br > ure prominently in its industry， small enough that an eco-<br > nomic slump barely recorded by the history books could<br > feel like a long， shuddering earthquake. Small enough<br > that， over the years， Webster himself did everything from<br > designing tools， to selling， to overseeing the company s<br > finances.<br >