May 27 - Cellophane Tape Day

On this day in history, cellophane tape was patented by Richard Drew, a banjo-playing inventor! In 1921, he went to work for the Minnesota Mining and Manufacturing Company, known as 3M, which at the time only manufactured sandpaper. He was product testing for Wetordry brand sandpaper at a local auto body shop when he noticed the auto painters were having a hard time making clean dividing lines on two-colour paint jobs. This dilemma inspired him to invent masking tape in 1925.

"Scotch" tape got its name when, upon testing his new masking tape to determine how much adhesive to add, the body shop painter grew frustrated with the sample and told him to "take this tape back to those Scotch bosses of yours and tell them to put more adhesive on it"!

Scotch brand cellulose tape was invented five years later. Without this man, we'd still be tying our Christmas presents with string! (Maybe some of us still do!)

Today is also Whit Sunday, Memorial Day, and Prayer for Peace Memorial Day.

Here are some interesting things that happened on this day in history:

- St. Petersburg was founded by Peter the Great in 1703.
- James S. McLean patented his piano in 1796.
- The Ontario government created Algonquin Park in 1893, Canada's first provincial park.

- William Arthur Irwin, former editor of Maclean's magazine was born in Ayr, Ontario in 1898.
- Editor Francess Halpenny, who was general editor of the Dictionary of Canadian Biography, was born in Ottawa in 1919.
- Afghanistan achieved sovereignty in 1921, after 84 years of British control.
- Piccard & Knipfer made the 1st flight into the stratosphere, by balloon, in 1931.
- Walt Disney's "3 Little Pigs" was released in 1933.
- The Golden Gate Bridge was dedicated in 1937.
- Dorie Miller was awarded the navy cross for deeds at Pearl Harbor in 1942.
- Folk singer Bruce Cockburn was born in Ottawa in 1945.

- The Northern Alberta Institute of Technology (NAIT) opened in Edmonton in 1963.
- Montréal was awarded a National League baseball franchise in 1968, to be known as the Montreal Expos.
- Construction on Walt Disney World began in 1969.
- In Culpeper, Virginia, actor Christopher Reeve was paralyzed from the neck down after falling from his horse in a riding competition in 1995. After vigorous physical and respiratory therapy, in December of 1995, he was finally able to breathe without a ventilator for a period of 30 minutes. On October 10, 2004, Reeve died of cardiac arrest at the age of 52.

- Oklahoma City bombing: Michael Fortier was sentenced to 12 years in prison and fined $200,000 in 1998 for failing to warn authorities about the Oklahoma City bombing.
- Canadian astronaut Julie Payette took part in a space shuttle mission in 1999. She and a co-worker repaired faulty parts in the Russian space station Zarya's battery pack.

- Legendary Montreal Canadien and Hockey Hall of Famer Maurice "Rocket" Richard died in Montréal at age 79 in 2000.

Stay tuned for our next, "On This Day in History"!