The Boy, the Barrel, and the Idea That Outlived Him

From a broken horse-pistol barrel behind a Canadian barn to a bolt-action mechanism carried by the British Army for nearly a century, James Paris Lee spent decades being told no by ordnance boards and military trials before his double-column detachable box magazine finally succeeded. Harmonia traces his long chain of rejections and near-misses, and reflects on what happens when a stubborn idea outlives the person who built it, passed hand to hand through generations of engineers the way a manuscript passes through generations of copyists. Transcript available at: https://harmonia.email/podcast-episode/boy-barrel-and-idea-outlived-him Share and read comments: https://harmonia.email/podcast-comments?field_podcast_feed_value=harmonia_s_history&from_node=427