On this day in 1948 Robert E. Jasperson was granted the patent for Automatic Navigational Director. U.S. Patent No. 2,444,933.
This invention relates to means for determining and indicating automatically and continuously the geographical position of an airborne, sea or land craft or missile, and for directing said craft to any other geographical position by automatic reference to celestial bodies. In the form illustrated, it is particularly adapted for use on aircraft and guided missiles, since this type of vehicle usually changes its geographical position too rapidly to allow the normal time consuming observations and manual operation of navigational instruments now used on aircraft, to provide for proper and timely operation of the controls in the craft so as to direct it most expeditiously toward either a predetermined destination or toward a new destination suddenly determined upon.
