John M. Browning

John M. Browning of Morgan is being inducted for obvious reasons — the list of guns he invented during the last quarter of the 19th century and continuing through the first quarter of the 20th defies belief: the Model 1894 lever action rifle, the Model 1897 pump shotgun, the .22 caliber pump and single-shot rifles, as well as rifles, handguns (the Colt 45 is a Browning invention), machine guns, cannons, and antiaircraft guns for other arms companies and the U.S. military. In 1883 he was approached by Winchester Repeating Arms Company, and for the next 19 years designed guns for Winchester that made them the largest producer of sporting arms in the U.S. It was during this time that Browning designed the Auto-Five, the first gas-operated automatic shotgun. Since its invention in 1899, the Browning A-5 is still in production and to date has sold more than 1.25 million under the Fabrique name alone and untold tens of thousands under the name of Remington, Franchi, Beda, Save, and others.