This young man grew up during the Depression. He graduated from high school in 1939 and took a job with Vega Aircraft Company (a subsidiary of Lockheed). When World War II came around, he enlisted in the U.S. Marine Corps and worked in Aviation Ordnance.
Post-war, he went to work in a machine shop for an aircraft equipment company, where he soon became a design engineer. By 1954, he was working as a chief engineer for a division of Fairchild Engine & Airplane Corporation. Over his career, he received roughly 100 patents on his creations.
In 1972, he co-founded a weapons research and development company, ARES Inc. And in 1990, at the age of 68, he joined Knight Manufacturing Company, where he worked on small-arms design. He passed away in 1997 at the age of 74.
Click here to learn more about this inventor and find out why the Army recruited him in the 1950s to help develop firearms … and what he created. His is just one of the many fascinating treasures on display at the NRA National Firearms Museum in Fairfax, Va.
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