From humble beginnings…

In 1923, Dr. Oswald Fauntleroy and Dr. Jean-Herman Legubrois, both associate professors at the world-renowned Flignitz Institute, jointly filed a patent application for “a two-wheeled vehicle powered by energy extracted from nucleonic fission.” To capitalize on their pending patent, as well as other inventions developed during their employment as research engineers at the Flignitz Institute, the two men founded the Fauntleroy-Legubrois Atomic Bicycle Company in the spring of 1924.

Following accusations of “misappropriation of apparatus,” and unspecified acts of moral turpitude, the Flignitz Institute dismissed both professors during a raucous public meeting of the Board of Regents. Anonymous sources claimed that Fauntleroy and Legubrois had alienated the affections of several young female laboratory assistants, who were purportedly induced to participate in various lewd experiments involving nudity and hazardous radioactive isotopes.

The Flignitz Institute claimed ownership of all intellectual property in the patent application, and the Board of Regents sought to sieze control of the Fauntleroy-Legubrois Atomic Bicycle Company in a civil suit. A settlement was eventually reached, but only after protracted legal maneuvering drove Dr. Legubrois to commit suicide in 1927, and Dr. Fauntleroy to declare bankruptcy a few months later.

Under terms of the settlement, the business name was changed to Flignitz Atomic Bicycle and Weaving Machine Company, Dr. Fauntleroy was allowed to retain his title of Ancillary President of Engineering, and a mediocre sculptor in Akron, Ohio was commissioned to create a life-sized bronze bust of Dr. Jean-Herman Legubrois, to be placed on permanent memorial display in the lobby of the company headquarters.

In 1936, Dr. Oswald Fauntleroy became the first CEO of the newly formed Flignitz Corporation, then headquartered in Cincinnati, Ohio, USA.

Thus began the long and illustrious (and not entirely unpleasant) history of the great multinational conglomerate known today as the Flignitz Corporation.