Lonnie G. Johnson
Nuclear engineer, Galileo mission veteran, inventor of the Super Soaker
At a glance
- Inventor
- Lonnie G. Johnson
- Life
- b. 1949
- Birthplace
- Mobile, Alabama
- Country
- United States
- Region
- United States
- Era
- 1950–2000
- Fields
- Science & Engineering, Space & Aerospace
- Evidence
- Verified
- Records
- 1 in this archive
What they did
Johnson worked on the Galileo Jupiter mission's power systems at JPL, and, while experimenting with a heat pump using water instead of freon, patented the pressurised water gun that became the Super Soaker.
Historical context
Existing water pistols were feeble squirt toys. Johnson's insight was to pressurise a reservoir rather than pump each shot.
The legacy
One of the best-selling toys ever made; Johnson reinvested the royalties into thermo-electric energy conversion research.
The evidence
US Patent 4,591,071 — Squirt gun
Primary recordLonnie Johnson inductee record
Institutional record
Documentation strength
- 2
- Sources
- 1
- Primary
- 2
- Publishers
Calculated from the sources actually attached to this record — the closer a source sits to the original document, the more it counts. It is never asserted by hand.