John Moses Browning: The Self-Taught Genius Who Armed the World

John Moses Browning: The Self-Taught Genius Who Armed the World video by The Unsung.

Summary:

When you think of the most influential weapons in modern history, names like Colt, Winchester, or the U.S. Military come to mind. But behind every one of those iconic guns—the M1911 pistol, the Winchester Model 1894, the Browning Automatic Rifle, the .50 Caliber M2 Machine Gun—was a single, self-taught inventor from Utah: John Moses Browning. With over 120 patents, his mechanical genius defined small arms design for over a century, yet his name remains largely unknown to the public.

This episode of The Unsung uncovers how Browning's intuitive understanding of mechanics led to one breakthrough after another, and how his legacy was systematically absorbed by the manufacturing giants he worked with. We explore the man who operated not from a corporate lab, but from a small workshop, and ask why the architect of modern warfare is a ghost in the history books.