Joe Sutter & The Incredibles: The Team That Built The 1st Boeing 747

Boeing’s first 747 was shaped by the engineering leadership of Joe Sutter, later dubbed by the National Air and Space Museum “Father of the 747.” Sutter, who joined Boeing in 1945 after studying aeronautical engineering at the University of Washington, became chief project engineer for an aircraft larger than anything the company had built. The program—run by thousands of Boeing employees collectively known as “The Incredibles”—also became a new industrial model for building aircraft at scale. From conception to rollout took about 29 months, with the first 747 rolling out on September 30, 1968, flying first on February 9, 1969, and entering Pan Am’s New York–London service in January 1970.