Résumé

In recent years, some historians and sociologists have noted the plausibility of adapting ethnographic approaches to human behavior and artifacts in studying complex, technologically-based organizations and processes, such as are common in aeronautic and aerospace research and development. This article undertakes to explore such possibilities through examining the ways in which French and U.S. jet engine development was documented and managed through forms that organized information for tracking maintenance and assisting decision making. Situational characteristics and different engineering traditions help to account for the distinctive patterns these documentary artifacts defined during the early decades of Cold War military innovation. The forms and their uses also suggest sharply different relationships between military agencies and engine builders in the two nations.