In Memory of Dennis Tippmann Sr - Inventor - Father of Mini Brownings

[Arthur Fliegenheimer]

Dennis Jude Tippmann Sr passed away at the age of 74 back on November 23, 2020.

 

Inducted to The Paint Ball Hall of Fame in 2020

 

"In 1983 Denny Tippmann Sr, started the original Tippmann Arms Company. He, originally manufactured collectible, .22 caliber half-scale replica belt-fed machine gun. However, a change in gun laws led to his entry into the paintball market in 1986; forming Tippmann Pneumatics Inc.'

Dennis Tippmann, Sr., president of Tippmann Industrial Products Inc., is an idea man. Holding more than 16 patents, Tippmann has a knack for recognizing the potential market for a not-yet-invented item. He then creates merchandise that will meet the demands of that new market. One of 17 children, Tippmann credits his father with teaching him about business and how to develop and manufacture products.

 

“I remember watching my father and older brothers create ice machines. If a prototype didn’t work, they never got discouraged. They kept trying new ways to build the product,” Tippmann says, describing the development of one of his father’s most successful inventions, the Tippmann Plate Crushed Ice Machine. Tippmann’s father sold the ice machine patent to Burge Ice Machine Company in Chicago, which produced ice machines used all over the world. “All the crushed ice in the world comes from my father’s invention.”

 

Inspired by such entrepreneurial success, Tippmann entered the paintball business in its infancy.

“Until 1985, the only way you could buy a paintball gun was to buy a whole franchise. There were no guns for sale,” he says. “I saw a new opportunity, so I started producing paintball guns.”

Then operating as Tippmann Pneumatics, the firm became one of the leading paintball gun manufacturers in the country.

http://www.businesspeople.com/Post/796/paintball-pioneer