Jack Parsons

Who was Jack Parsons?

John Whiteside Parsons, better known as Jack Parsons, was an American rocket engineer, chemist, and Thelemite occultist. A pioneer in solid-fuel rocket research and development, he was the inventor of the first castable, composite solid-propellant rocket. He was associated with the California Institute of Technology, and was one of the principal founders of both the Jet Propulsion Laboratory and the Aerojet Engineering Corporation.

Born in Los Angeles, California, Parsons was raised by a wealthy family in Pasadena. Inspired by science fiction literature, he developed an early interest in rocketry and in 1928 began amateur rocket experiments with school friend Edward Forman. He was forced to drop out of Pasadena Junior College and Stanford University due to financial difficulties during the Great Depression, but in 1934 he united with Forman and graduate student Frank Malina to form the Caltech-affiliated GALCIT Rocket Research Group, supported by Guggenheim Aeronautical Laboratory chairman Theodore von Kármán.