中心樞紐
Smith completed two tours in Vietnam, eventual flying more than 200 ground-support missions. While on his first tour, in Vietnam, he survived an ambush that left most of his company dead. During the assault he became separated from his gun, but the managed to retrieve the weapon in time to bring down a Vietcong soldier who was about to attack him. He had also learned a valuable lesson from the war. "There're only three things you gotta remember," he said, "shoot, move, and communicate."
史密斯在越南參加了兩次飛行,總共完成了200多次地面支援飛行任務(wù)。在越南的第一次飛行中,他們遭遇突襲,戰(zhàn)友大多數(shù)都犧牲了,而他僥幸生還。戰(zhàn)斗中,他的槍支脫手,但他及時(shí)奪回武器并擊斃了一名正準(zhǔn)備攻擊他的越南士兵。戰(zhàn)爭給史密斯上了寶貴的一課。他說:“你只需記住3件事:開槍、移動(dòng)和聯(lián)絡(luò)。”
Home from Vietnam, Smith became fascinated by the notion that if you connected all the points of a network through a central hub, the efficiency could be enormous, whether the system involved moving packages and letters or people and planes. With an investment from his father's company, as well as a chunk of his own inheritance, Smith bought his first Das sault Falcon planes, and in 1971 formed the Federal Express Corporation.
從越南回來后,史密斯開始執(zhí)著于這樣一種想法,如果把網(wǎng)絡(luò)內(nèi)所有的點(diǎn)都連接到一個(gè)中心樞紐,無論是運(yùn)送包裹和信件,還是人和飛機(jī),都會(huì)極富效率。他拿著父親企業(yè)的投資以及一大部分繼承的財(cái)產(chǎn),購買了第一架達(dá)索爾特鷹式飛機(jī)。1971年,史密斯創(chuàng)辦了聯(lián)邦快遞公司。
注釋:
1. separate vt. 使分離;使分開;使分居
例句:Then she would go and live with her children, happily ever after thrashing rice toseparate it from the husk. 于是,她就會(huì)去和她的兒女們生活在一起,然后幸福地打稻谷,把稻米和谷殼分開。
2. valuable adj. 有價(jià)值的;貴重的;可估價(jià)的
例句:It is suicidal pottering away valuable time. 浪費(fèi)寶貴的時(shí)光等于自殺。
3. enormous adj. 龐大的,巨大的;兇暴的,極惡的
例句:And the Internet is not the only tool we have. But it has enormous potential. 互聯(lián)網(wǎng)也不是我們所擁有的惟一工具,但它卻有巨大的潛力。