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After posting a thread a few weeks ago regarding the 1908 Colt Pocket Pistols (Browning's design and invention) a Forum member read my post and graciously offered me the one book on JM Browning I never read. I accepted his offer and I am about 3/4 done with the book - hard to put down. The title is John M. Browning / American Gunmaker by John Browning (son) and Curt Gentry.
I thought I knew pretty much everything about the man's career but I will admit to leaning a bunch more. It's just mind blowing how one man can affect an entire industry such as the likes of Henry Ford, Thomas Edison, Albert Einstein, and a few others have. It's also interesting how read about a man who basically though of almost nothing else his entire life.
Even though I do think of myself as a pretty diverse, mechanically inclined person (for an amateur), I am just blown away to what he was able to come up with in his mind alone - remember he had very little to go by at that time and given he lived in the sticks!
I was talking to a few "gun friends" this morning and after I told them the models, brands and guns he invented not marked Browning, they were also blown away as to just how much JM invented and sold under other brand names. I also was unaware that the majority of the guns he invented and sold to Winchester were never even made - they were never intended to be! Winchester bought them up strictly to keep them out of the hands of competitors. Back then, Winchester could simply not produce all the Browning designs they bought, so they cherry picked. They also did not want to beat down some of their own antiquated designs.
I also learned that after inventing his first successful machine gun, the US Military wasn't interested in buying it and it literally sat in a corner of his shop for years! Since there was no war on the horizon at that time, they felt they didn't need to spend the money on something that would just sit around. Finally as WW1 was approaching, the US Military wised up.
I still have to finish the book and should do that tomorrow. If anyone here is really interested in this man and his life's work, they should read this book if they have not already done so. I have many Browning designed guns and even some Browning marked guns (Fabrique National - Belgium) and now will look at them in a better light when I handle, shoot and clean them.
WOW - what a career!
I thought I knew pretty much everything about the man's career but I will admit to leaning a bunch more. It's just mind blowing how one man can affect an entire industry such as the likes of Henry Ford, Thomas Edison, Albert Einstein, and a few others have. It's also interesting how read about a man who basically though of almost nothing else his entire life.
Even though I do think of myself as a pretty diverse, mechanically inclined person (for an amateur), I am just blown away to what he was able to come up with in his mind alone - remember he had very little to go by at that time and given he lived in the sticks!
I was talking to a few "gun friends" this morning and after I told them the models, brands and guns he invented not marked Browning, they were also blown away as to just how much JM invented and sold under other brand names. I also was unaware that the majority of the guns he invented and sold to Winchester were never even made - they were never intended to be! Winchester bought them up strictly to keep them out of the hands of competitors. Back then, Winchester could simply not produce all the Browning designs they bought, so they cherry picked. They also did not want to beat down some of their own antiquated designs.
I also learned that after inventing his first successful machine gun, the US Military wasn't interested in buying it and it literally sat in a corner of his shop for years! Since there was no war on the horizon at that time, they felt they didn't need to spend the money on something that would just sit around. Finally as WW1 was approaching, the US Military wised up.
I still have to finish the book and should do that tomorrow. If anyone here is really interested in this man and his life's work, they should read this book if they have not already done so. I have many Browning designed guns and even some Browning marked guns (Fabrique National - Belgium) and now will look at them in a better light when I handle, shoot and clean them.
WOW - what a career!
