Richard Gurley Drew
Richard Gurley Drew (born June 22, 1899 in St. Paul , Minnesota , † December 14, 1980 in Santa Barbara , California ) was an American inventor who worked for 3M and invented the masking tape .
When he started at 3M in St. Paul , Minnesota in 1923 , 3M was a manufacturer of sandpaper . When the company tested their new Wetordry sandpaper in auto stores, Drew learned that the popular two-tone paint had problems with color transition.
After two years of work in the laboratory, in 1925 he invented masking tape, a five centimeter wide strip of paper with a thin layer of adhesive.
The first adhesive tape had an adhesive layer along the edge, but not in the middle. At the first try it fell off the car and the frustrated painter growled: “Take this tape back to those Scotch bosses of yours and tell them to put more adhesive on it.” ( “Bring the tape back to your Scottish bosses and tell them , they should apply more glue. " ) With" Scotch "he meant" misers ". That then became the name of his invention.
In 1930 they also sold transparent cellophane adhesive tape, the forerunner of the products now sold under the names "Scotch tape" (USA), "Sellotape" (Great Britain) and " Tesa " (Germany).
Web links
- History of 3M tapes
- Short biography on invent.org (English)
- U.S. Patent 1,760,820 dated May 27, 1930 for Richard Drew tape
| personal data | |
|---|---|
| SURNAME | Drew, Richard Gurley |
| ALTERNATIVE NAMES | Drew, Richard G. |
| BRIEF DESCRIPTION | American inventor of adhesive tape |
| DATE OF BIRTH | June 22, 1899 |
| PLACE OF BIRTH | St. Paul , Minnesota |
| DATE OF DEATH | December 14, 1980 |
| Place of death | Santa Barbara , California |