Jack Parsons

John Whiteside Parsons, known as Jack Parsons, was an American rocket engineer, chemist and Thelemite occultist, born in 1914 and dying in 1952. He was one of the principal founders of both the Jet Propulsion Laboratory and Aerojet, and he invented the first rocket engine to use a castable, composite rocket propellant. Raised in Pasadena, California, he began amateur rocket experiments with his school friend Edward Forman in 1928, and in 1934 he, Forman and Frank Malina formed the Caltech-affiliated GALCIT Rocket Research Group with support from Theodore von Karman. The group developed jet-assisted takeoff rockets for the US military and founded Aerojet in 1942. Parsons was dismissed from JPL and Aerojet in 1944 because of his involvement with the Ordo Templi Orientis and his hazardous laboratory practices.