Lonnie Johnson (inventor)
| Lonnie George Johnson | |
|---|---|
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Johnson in 2016
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| Born |
October 6, 1949 Mobile, Alabama, United States |
| Nationality | American |
| Education | Williamson High School |
| Alma mater | Tuskegee University |
| Occupation | Engineer, inventor |
| Known for | Super Soaker |
Lonnie George Johnson (born October 6, 1949) is an American inventor and engineer who holds more than 80 patents. Johnson is best known for inventing the Super Soaker water gun, which has ranked among the world's top 20 best-selling toys every year since its release.
Johnson's father was a World War II veteran and his mother worked as a nurse's aide and they lived in Mobile, Alabama. As a child, Johnson was very innovative and curious. Some of this curiosity coming at the expense of his family's possessions. He reverse engineered his sister's doll to understand how the eyes closed. He also almost burned down his own house while making rocket fuel. In addition, he built his own go-cart out of a lawnmower engine he attached to scraps he found in the junkyard. In his teenage years, Johnson attended the all-black Williamson High School in Mobile. He drew much of his inspiration from George Washington Carver. In 1968, Johnson represented his high school in the Alabama science fair. He was the only black student in the fair, at the time when blacks were discouraged away from science. He created a robot he named "Linex", which was a compressed-air powered robot; he took home first prize. Johnson then went on to attend college at Tuskegee University on a math scholarship. When he finished, he earned a B.S. in Mechanical Engineering and a M.S. in Nuclear Engineering from Tuskegee University.
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After college, Johnson joined the U.S. Air Force, where he worked on the stealth bomber program. Later, he worked at NASA's Jet Propulsion Lab with the nuclear power source for the Galileo mission to Jupiter. More recently, he teamed up with scientists from Tulane University and Tuskegee University to develop a method of transforming heat into electricity with the goal of making green energy more affordable.
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