Hulking, 300-lb. multimillionaire, twice-divorced Donald Roebling never set out to be a munitions inventor. Grandson of Brooklyn Bridge Builder Washington A. Roebling, he could have raced fancy cars, captained yachts, cavorted on his Clearwater, Fla. showplace estate for a lifetime. But last week amphibious tractors, invented by 34-year-old Donald, were rolling off the production lines of four big U.S. manufacturers, were the pride & joy of the U.S. Navy, were one of the reasons for U.S. successes at Guadalcanal.
The Hurricane. It all started back in 1935 when a disastrous hurricane screamed through the Florida Everglades, left young Donald convinced that an amphibious vehicle could have saved many lives. So he built an expensive, well-equipped machine shop on his estate, hired experienced workers, on the fourth try put a lumbering boxlike four-ton monster through its paces. With a terrible roar it clambered through mangrove swamps, crunched eight-inch trees, splashed over bayous. Donald promptly named his new machine Alligator, went to work on bigger & better models.
He did so well that in February 1941 the Navy ordered Alligators worth over $3,000,000. Their job: to haul men, munitions and supplies from battleships and transports on to enemy shores, thus speed and simplify dangerous invasion jobs. Donald looked around for a manufacturer, finally handed the order to nearby Food Machinery Corp. (spray pumps, fruit washers, etc.), which normally makes nothing more deadly than a peach pitter, but had made parts for Roebling's experimental models. Today Food Machinery alone has orders for over $50,000,000 worth of Alligators, and hundreds of others are being made by Borg-Warner, Graham-Paige Motors and St. Louis Car Co. More than 100 Alligators already have been in service; the Navy has set up two schools to train Alligator drivers.
The Rewards. However vital to the war effort, Donald Roebling is not making a penny from his Alligators. He turned the whole invention over to the Government, waved aside all commissions, even got Food Machinery to cut its contract price. To Donald this is his contribution to the war and he is glad to make it.