Jack (Jacob) Rempel was born March 26th, 1918 in Edenwold, Saskatchewan to Reverend Jacob and Martha Rempel. He was first married in 1939. He bought a car dealership, Whiteshell Motors, in 1937 located in Seven Sisters, Manitoba . His second car dealership was Rempel Motors located in Winnipeg, Manitoba. He was divorced in 1948 and remarried in 1949. In 1950 the business fell on hard times, and he and his family left for California where he worked selling cars. A few years later he returned to Canada and settled in Toronto under the assumed name of John Gower and opened his own gun shop, JGR Gunsport.

The name was derived from his names Jack / John, Gower and Rempel. His first notable invention was the 22 JGR which was a .22 caliber high yield center fire rifle round. It was featured in Gunsport magazine in 1959. During this time he met a young swiss engineer, Fred Rohrer, who arrived at JGR Gunsport to buy a firearm, but ended up spending much of the time discussing his passion for Tanks. John convinced Fred to help him with his dream of building an ultra-light, all purpose, small, outdoor vehicle. This friendship would prove to be the basis of an historic development.