Lonnie George Johnson (born October 6, 1949) is an American inventor, aerospace engineer, and entrepreneur, best known for inventing the bestselling Super Soaker water gun in 1989.

[4] Stating that he "always liked to tinker with things," Johnson earned the nickname "the Professor" from kids in the neighborhood.

[4] In 1969, shortly after graduating from high school, Johnson attended Tuskegee University, obtaining a B.S.

[12][13][14] JEMS has developed the Johnson Thermo-Electrochemical Converter System (JTEC) which Popular Mechanics listed as one of the top 10 inventions of 2009.

[16] Johnson is a "part of a group of African American inventors whose work accounts for 6 percent of all U.S. patent applications".

Initially called the "Power Drencher" when it first appeared in toy shops in 1990, it eventually got its trademark name after some tweaks and remarketing.

[19] In February 2013 Johnson filed suit against Hasbro after he discovered that he was being underpaid royalties for the Super Soaker and several Nerf toys.

He received several awards from NASA for his work in spacecraft system design at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory.