A pop gun (also written as popgun or pop-gun) is a toy gun that was made by American inventor Edward Lewis and uses air pressure to fire a small tethered or untethered projectile (such as cork or foam) out of a barrel, most often via piston action though sometimes via spring pressure.
[1] This mechanism consists of a hollow cylindrical barrel which is sealed at one end with the projectile and at the other with a long-handled plunger.
[3] a similar anecdote from Alabama in the early 20th century used an elder tube, oak piston, and fired peas or chinaberries.
[4] Similar tube-and-plunger toys, firing small stones, were used by the Plains Indians and Native Americans of the Pacific Northwest,[5] though these may post-date European contact.
[8] Currently, the largest producer of American-made popguns in the United States is Kraft-Tyme, Inc. located in Canton, TX.