John Moses Browning

1855 – 1926

John Moses Browning was born January 1855 to Elizabeth and Johnathan Browning in the settlement of Ogden, Utah Territory. Johnathan was an early Mormon convert, traveling across the country with his wife and children before settling in Utah and marrying twice more. With the first family somewhat estranged from the latter two John would become head of the Utah families after Johnathan’s death.

Johnathan had been a gunsmith prior to his move west, including producing rifles of his own design. However, such a specialty was rarely needed on the frontier and Johnathan would maintain a general repair and gunsmith shop while also exploring other business ventures once in Ogden. John grew up working in his father’s various business ventures, including the metal working and repair shop, and found particular talent as gunsmith and stock maker. John was the only son to work full time in the shop, and by the time he was a teen largely ran its daily operations.

1879 was an eventful year for John. He married local Rachael Child. He purchased his father’s workshop, together with his younger brother Matt. Matt joined him running the shop full time. John also submitted and was granted patent on a single shot rifle he had designed and built the year prior. In June 1879 Johnathan Browning Died.

Under John and Matt’s direction the business grew enough to bring on another brother, Ed Browning. By 1880 John and Matt decided to produce John’s patented rifle themselves and build a small factory with the assistance of another two brothers Sam and George. Between 1880 and 1883 the Browning Brothers produced about 600 rifles.

During that time John also invented three all-in-one reloading tools, as well as a bolt action and lever action repeating rifle. The repeating rifles were never produced, but the loading tools were sold as accessories to the single-shot rifles. The first loading tool was patented and later sold to Marlin in 1882. The second was produced between 1882 and 1883 before Winchester claimed patent infringement. The third was briefly produced during 1883 but never patented.

Winchester purchased the single-shot rifle patent in 1883 and another lever action rifle in 1884. Those two sales gave John the ability to forego manufacturing and focus the rest of his career on independent invention of firearms. Meanwhile, Matt and several other Browning brothers would turn the former factory and repair business into one of the largest sporting goods stores in the country.

In addition to perpetual invention of small arms, John founded or served a variety of local business interests. The ability to maintain a relative independence from the companies that produced his designs contributed to Browning’s creation of a wide range of firearm types.

Although properly lauded as America’s preeminent firearm designer, Browning would spend roughly half his life in Belgium where Fabrique Nationale produced some of his most successful designs. It was in the FN factory at Leige where Browning died the day after Thanksgiving, 1926.