Glock is an austrian company founded by Gaston Glock in 1963. At first they
produced machinegun belts, hand grenades, bayonets, knives and other products
which combined plastic and steel.
The Glock 17, Glock's first handgun, was introduced in 1983. The austrian
military bought 25,000 of these simple (321 interchangable
components), lightweight (625 grams when empty2, mostly due to
the polymer frame) 9mm semi-automatic handguns.
The Glock 17 was later adapted by the armies of India, Jordan, Thailand,
Norway and the Philippines. It was also selected as the official european
NATO handgun. The Glock 19 has also been approved for NATO use.
Current models include the .45 Glock 30 subcompact handgun, and the
fully automatic Glock 18, weighing in at under 700 grams each.
They are protected by Glocks "Safe Action" system, which consists of
trigger safety (triggered only when the applied force is centered),
firing pin safety (the pin is readied only when the trigger is moved
backwards) and drop safety (firing pin pushes trigger bar downwards, again
disabled by moving the trigger backwards). Of course, these safety
measures are relevant for accidents only, and are certainly not to prevent
children from using it. That is still the gun owner's job!
In 1985 Glock expanded its business to the United States and opened its
first office in Smyrna, Georgia. Why they celebrated their tenth
anniversary in the US in 1986 is beyond me.
A well-spread myth concerning Glock's handguns is that they do not trigger
metal detectors, because of their plastic frame. This is false, because the
slides and barrels are composed fully of steel, and the plastic frame has
some metal parts molten into it (not to mention the metal rounds that go
into it).
1 1983 model. Current model 17 has 33 components.
2 Weight of current model 17. The 1983 model may have differed.
Resources: Glock, FreeRepublic.com