Richard Drew, Mystery Man of Innovation

For some reason, I recently stumbled across an article about the man who invented Scotch tape, Richard Gurley Drew. He worked for 3M, of course, which is synonymous with the brand.

But the story went in directions I didn't expect. Drew invented masking tape before he invented Scotch tape. And the invention of masking tape is core to how 3M came to be the company known for innovation by allowing its engineers and inventors the freedom to think outside the box before "think outside the box" had even become a cliché. Without trying too hard to read between the lines in the company's history, it seems as though 3M might never have broken out of the sandpaper business if it weren't for Drew.

Drew's biography before he was at 3M is sketchy, though, which seems odd to me. All I could find is that he was born in 1899 in Saint Paul, he went to city schools, and he dropped out of the University of Minnesota. The various bios and obituaries never say which high school he went to, or what part of town he lived in. I assume it was Saint Paul Central, which was one of few high schools in the city at the time, but the Wikipedia page for Central doesn't claim him as an illustrious alum, which you'd think it would. 

Everyone knows exactly where Charles Schultz grew up, for instance. Or all the houses F. Scott Fitzgerald lived in when he was a child. Why doesn't anyone seem to know where Richard Drew's family lived?

Maybe he's not quite famous enough, but I think he is. Saint Paul needs to do more to claim its innovators.