Firearm Factory of the Month: Intratec

 Today we visit the company made famous by criminals and authoritarians bent on ruling over others.

Our story begins in Sweden in 1943 when Goran Lars Magnus Kjellgren aka George Kellgren was born.

After a stint in the Swedish Navy, George started his career in the gun industry at Husqvarna, many may be surprised to hear that the maker of chain saws and motorcycles also makes guns, but it is true.

When Husqvarna quit making guns (probably due to a government contract expiration), George moved to South Africa for a short time.

Later he was hired to work at Interdynamic AB (the AB denotes the company as being investor owned) in Stockholm.

George, along with his staff designed a small 9mm sub-machine gun based on the Carl Gustav M45. They called it the MP9. The design needed some work, for starters it was too small, fired too fast and was difficult to control.

Interdynamic had to find buyers for their pistol. Their original intended market was military and law enforcement, which in Europe is limited and saturated with competitors who make quality, proven firearms.

So, in 1979 George moved to the U.S. and opened Interdynamic USA, he partnered with Carlos Garcia.

There were issues with the MP9 being sold in America, for starters it would have to be sold as a NFA item, fully automatic or not, the gun had features (like a short barrel combined with a shoulder stock) that made the gun a restricted item. That doesn't mean the gun could not be manufactured and sold, but it did mean that the market for such a weapon would be very limited.

When redesigned into a semi-automatic pistol the KG-9 (KG for Kellgren & Garcia) the gun still fired from an open bolt, which the BATF poo pooed, so the gun would have to be reworked yet again.

The gun was reworked into a semi-automatic pistol, fired from a closed bolt.

In 1983 the prototype was finished and was dubbed the KG-99, this gun would eventually become the Tec-9/AB-10.

Later that year George decided to split ways and sold his interest in Interdynamic USA to Garcia, who renamed the company Intratec.

Kellgren went on to found Grendel and Kel-Tec the latter of which is still in business.

The mid-late 80s saw a serious rise in drug trafficking and the violent crime that went with it. Intratecs two signature guns the Tec-9 and the Tec-22 were inexpensive and had higher magazine capacities than the typical pistols available then.

Tec-9

Tec-22

This made them popular with the criminal gangs. This combined with several high-profile mass shootings involving the Tec-9 led to lawsuits. Then there was the "Assault Weapons Ban" of 1994.

The Tec-9 was redesigned to comply with the 1994 AWB, but sales were slow, and the lawsuits kept piling up. By 2001 the company was filing for bankruptcy.

Carlos Garcia had started a new company to receive the assets for Intratec, but nothing ever came of it.

What Remains:

The guns have a hot and cold relationship with collectors, many want one just because of its infamous role in crime, some want one for kicks, others are interested in the history of George Kellgren and these types of pistols.

The guns were used in quite a few movies including Beverly Hills Cop II, Robo Cop I & II and Big Trouble in Little China.

The gun was also a staple on shows like Miami Vice and the A-Team. The gun (a pair of them actually) was also the chosen sidearm for super spy Lana Kane in the adult cartoon Archer.

The guns were manufactured in a building on SW 130th Street in south Miami near the Kendall neighborhood. The building still stands.