James Smith "Mac" McDonnell (April 9, 1899 – August 22, 1980) was an American aviator, engineer, and businessman. He was an aviation pioneer and founder of McDonnell Aircraft Corporation, later McDonnell Douglas, and the James S. McDonnell Foundation. Early life Born in Denver, Colorado, McDonnell was raised in Little Rock, Arkansas, and graduated from Little Rock High School in 1917. He was a graduate of Princeton University class of 1921, and earned a Master's of Science in Aeronautical Engineering from MIT in 1925. While attending MIT he joined the Delta Upsilon fraternity. After graduating from MIT, he was hired by Tom Towle for the Stout Metal Airplane Division of the Ford Motor Company. In 1927, he was hired by the Hamilton Metalplane Company to develop similar metal monoplanes. He then went on to Huff Daland Airplane Company. Career In 1928, McDonnell left Huff Daland and set up J.S. McDonnell & Associates, and with the help of two other engineers, McDonnell set out to design his first aircraft with his company name. This aircraft then competed in a safe airplane contest which was sponsored by the Daniel Guggenheim Fund for the Promotion of Aeronautics and which offered a $100,000 prize for the winning entry. His design was the Doodle Bug. After the failure of the Doodle Bug to win the contest (the Curtiss Tanager won) or any commercial orders due to the Great Depression, he dissolved his firm and worked for the Great Lakes Aircraft Company in 1931 before he was hired as an engineer for the Glenn L. Martin Company. McDonnell resigned from Martin in 1938 and founded McDonnell Aircraft Corporation in 1939. Headquartered in St. Louis, the company quickly grew into a principal supplier of fighter aircraft to the U.S. Air Force and U.S. Navy—including the F-4 Phantom II—and built the Mercury and Gemini space capsules. In 1967, McDonnell Aircraft merged with the Douglas Aircraft Company to create McDonnell Douglas. Later that year Douglas Aircraft Company's space and missiles division became part of a new subsidiary called McDonnell Douglas Astronautics, located in Huntington Beach, California, producing the Delta series of launch vehicles. The new combined company also developed the F-15 Eagle and F/A-18 Hornet fighters. He served as chairman of the United Nations Association of the United States, and in 1958 his company became the first organization in the world to celebrate United Nations Day as a paid holiday.