Richard Gurley Drew (June 22, 1899 – December 14, 1980) was an American inventor who worked for

Johnson and Johnson Johnson & Johnson (J&J) is an American Multinational corporation, multinational Pharmaceutical industry, pharmaceutical, biotechnology, and Medical device, medical technologies corporation headquartered in New Brunswick, New Jersey, and publi ...

, Permacel Co., and 3M in

St. Paul, Minnesota Saint Paul (often abbreviated St. Paul) is the capital city of the U.S. state of Minnesota and the county seat of Ramsey County. As of the 2020 census, the city had a population of 311,527, making it Minnesota's second-most populous city a ...

, where he invented

masking tape Masking tape, also known as painter's tape, is a type of pressure-sensitive tape made of a thin and easy-to-tear paper, and an easily released pressure-sensitive adhesive. It is available in a variety of widths. It is used mainly in painting, ...

and

cellophane Cellophane is a thin, transparent sheet made of regenerated cellulose. Its low permeability to air, oils, greases, bacteria, and liquid water makes it useful for food packaging. Cellophane is highly permeable to water vapour, but may be coate ...

tape.

Biography

When Drew joined 3M in

in 1921, it was a modest manufacturer of

sandpaper upright=1.35, Sheets of sandpaper with different grit sizes (40 (coarse), 80, 150, 240, 600 (fine)) Sandpaper, also known as coated abrasive or emery paper, is a type of material that consists of sheets of paper or cloth with an abrasive substa ...

. While testing their new Wetordry sandpaper at auto shops, Drew was intrigued to learn that the two-tone auto paintjobs so popular in the

Roaring Twenties The Roaring Twenties, sometimes stylized as Roaring '20s, refers to the 1920s decade in music and fashion, as it happened in Western world, Western society and Western culture. It was a period of economic prosperity with a distinctive cultura ...

were difficult to manage at the border between the two colors. In response, after two years of work in 3M's labs, Drew invented the first

(1925), a two-inch-wide tan paper strip backed with a light,

pressure-sensitive adhesive Pressure-sensitive adhesive (PSA, self-adhesive, self-stick adhesive) is a type of nonreactive adhesive which forms a bond when pressure is applied to bond the adhesive with a surface. No solvent, water, or heat is needed to activate the adhesive ...

. The first tape had adhesive along its edges but not in the middle. In its first trial run, it fell off the car and the frustrated auto painter growled at Drew, "take this tape back to those Scotch bosses of yours and tell them to put more adhesive on it!" (By "Scotch", he meant "cheap".) The nickname stuck, both to Drew's improved masking tape, and to his 1930 invention, Scotch Brand cellulose tape. In 1930 he came up with the world's first transparent cellophane adhesive tape (called ''

sellotape Sellotape () is a British brand of transparent, cellulose-based, pressure-sensitive tape, and is the leading brand in the United Kingdom. Sellotape is generally used for joining, sealing, attaching and mending. In much the same way that Scotch ...

'' in the UK and ''Scotch tape'' in the United States). During the

Great Depression The Great Depression was a severe global economic downturn from 1929 to 1939. The period was characterized by high rates of unemployment and poverty, drastic reductions in industrial production and international trade, and widespread bank and ...

, people began using Scotch tape to repair items rather than replace them. This was the beginning of 3M’s diversification into all manner of marketplaces and helped them to flourish in spite of the

. Drew died in 1980 in

Santa Barbara, California Santa Barbara (, meaning ) is a coastal city in Santa Barbara County, California, of which it is also the county seat. Situated on a south-facing section of coastline, the longest such section on the West Coast of the United States excepting A ...

References

External links

Live Science
{{DEFAULTSORT:Drew, Richard 1899 births 1980 deaths 20th-century American engineers 20th-century American inventors 3M people