The Pioneer Instrument Company was started by Morris Maxey Titterington and Brice Herbert Goldsborough in Brooklyn, New York in 1919. Charles Herbert Colvin was the president. They specialized in aeronautical instruments including a bubble sextant and the Earth Inductor Compass. The company later acquired control of Brandis & Sons, Inc., in 1922, and Pioneer was later acquired by the Bendix Aviation Corporation in 1928. As the United States was entering World War II, the company became the Pioneer Instrument Division of Bendix Aviation, and moved to New Jersey. By 1943 it had become the Eclipse-Pioneer Division of Bendix Aviation.