- [Narrator] There's this amazing picture of my coworker. It's him reading a Ninja Turtles book, lying next to a SuperSoaker. When the SuperSoaker came out, it was a game changer.
The slogan "wetter is better" was essentially a mantra for kids during summer break. So when I went to Atlanta to interview the guy responsible for all of that, I had to show him the photo. (Laughs) - That's funny.
- [Narrator] Lonnie Johnson invented the SuperSoaker back in 1982. But, that is not his only invention. - Well, I have over a hundred patents.
- [Narrator] Everything from the Nerf gun to a thermoelectric energy converter. He also worked on NASA’s Galileo mission to Jupiter and alongside the U. S.
military. - For the first SuperSoaker, actually, I made in my shop in my basement in the evenings when I would come home from work. And at the time I was actually working on the Stealth Bomber program, back when it was highly classified and I actually couldn't even tell my wife what I was working on during the daytime.
It was that top secret. - [Narrator] The original name for the SuperSoaker was The Drncher. - We ran into a challenge regarding the name because another inventor claimed it.
So we changed the name to SuperSoaker just to avoid having to deal with that. - [Narrator] SuperSoaker is definitely a way better name. When he started, Lonnie wasn't trying to create a toy for kids.
- I was working on a new type of heat pump that would use water as a working fluid instead of freon. And I was experimenting with some nozzles that I machined and I shot a stream of water across the bathroom and I thought, "Geez, maybe I should put this hard science stuff aside "and work on something fun like a water gun. " It still works.
- [Narrator] And this brings me back to a previous point. Lonnie Johnson is a super genius scientist. This is his lab.
And this is what he's working on now. - Yeah, right now I'm working on advanced battery technology. My goal is to develop a battery that will store about three times the energy of a lithium ion battery.
- [Narrator] In comparison the SuperSoaker might not seem as hard science, but it was still a really, really important invention.
