(side note: this is my comment that I left on Kat's page)
In the United States, this technology was pioneered by H. Julian Allen and A. J. Eggers Jr. of the National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics (NACA) at Ames Research Center.[5] In 1951, they made the counterintuitive discovery that a blunt shape (high drag) made the most effective heat shield.[6]