Malina, Frank J

American engineer, one of the inventors of the American liquid fuel rocket at Caltech in the 1930's. Led development of the WAC-Corporal rocket, but uninterested in military projects. Moved to Paris to work with UN and later was an artist.

Frank J. Malina was a young Caltech Ph.D. student in the mid-1930s when he began an aggressive rocket research program to design a high-altitude sounding rocket. Beginning in late 1936 Malina and his colleagues started the static testing of rocket engines in the canyons above the Rose Bowl, with mixed results, but a series of tests eventually led to the development of the WAC-Corporal rocket during World War II. After the war, Malina worked with the United Nations and eventually retired to Paris to pursue a career as an artist.