The bazooka round is an outgrowth of the M10 rifle grenade designed to be fired from the .50 machinegun (using a blank cartridge). Procured in limited quantity starting in 1940 the M10 formed the basis for the bazooka round. US Army Captain Skinner was assigned to develop and investigate the use of rockets in war at the time and with limited funds started development of an antitank rocket by fitting a motor to the M10 grenade.
His counterpart in the US Navy was Lieutenant Uhl and the two had had some dealings. Lt. Uhl and Cptn Skinner arranged to work together on making and launching M10 grenades with the rocket motor assembly attached. Uhl came up with the tube launcher while Skinner devised a firing mechanism. A test rig was ready in March 1942 and testing took place at Aberdeen Proving Ground. Someone at the tests pointed out the similarity of this device in looks to comedian Bob Burn's insturment the "Bazooka" and a weapon was named.
The tests went well and the US Army quickly ordered 5,000 produced. The US Navy saw no future use for this particular weapon so they withdrew from the project.
E. G. Budd Co. was the rocket manufacturer. Hercules Powder, DuPont Chemical, Atlas Powder and, American Cyanamid provided the motor fuel and explosives for the warhead. GE Bridgeport CT manufactured the launcher (they produced 5,000 in 30 days to the initial order) and eventually produced 450,000 launchers.