Ignatius Piazza - Biography

Biography

Piazza grew up in Livermore, California and attended Livermore High School, where he was a varsity athlete. He later became a doctor of chiropractic and owned a practice in California.

In lectures and presentations, he relates the story of the evening his home was the target of a random drive-by shooting. Escaping injury, he realized that the firearms he owned did him little good as he had no real training in their use. He made the decision to become the best he could be in the defensive use of his firearms, and wanted to teach others how to do the same. Ultimately, this led to his founding of Front Sight near Bakersfield, California in 1996, to "positively change the image of gun ownership in our lifetime".

In 1998, his concept expanded to include a complete "world-class" resort, like a "Disneyland for gun enthusiasts" and a town, Front Sight, Nevada, envisioned as "the safest community in America". Since this time, he has been working to build this resort about 45 minutes outside of Las Vegas, Nevada. His efforts have been covered by local news and gun enthusiast periodicals, but notably have received international exposure as well in the New York Times, Chicago Tribune, LA Times, BBC, Playboy Magazine, USA Today, San Francisco Chronicle, CNN, Washington Post, Forbes, and a piece by Diane Sawyer.

Piazza established a philanthropic project called Helping Those Who Help Others. The goal of this project is to focus on and contribute to charities with a proven track record, similar to a charitable trust. A list of charities which have been supported can be found at the project homepage.

In 2003, Piazza produced a documentary entitled Innocents Betrayed. The purpose of this documentary was to show the point of view that, historically, gun control has been used to disarm populations for the purpose of government sponsored genocide.

In 2006, Piazza created and began producing the reality television series Front Sight Challenge, airing on the Versus Network. Front Sight Challenge is now available for online viewing.

Through Front Sight, Piazza was involved in preparing actor Mark Wahlberg for his role in the 2007 film Shooter.

Piazza has been dubbed Millionaire Patriot for providing millions of dollars in firearms and training to help citizens protect themselves and their families.