RIP: Super Glue inventor Harry W. Coover, aged 94
Harry W. Coover, the inventor of the ingenius adhesive Super Glue, has died aged 94 of congestive heart failure.
Coover, who held over 460 patents, first discovered the recipe for the sticky substance in 1942 whilst working on plastic gun sights for the US military. Dismissing the findings (his creation didn’t quite fit the brief for the army), Coover rediscovered the substance in 1951 with colleague Fred Joyner at the Eastman Kodak firm, finally realising its commercial and industrial potential.
So then, anyone who’s accidentally broke their mother’s finest crockery, or made a miniature Airfix kit, raise a glass to Mr Coover.
My little brother once Super Glue’d his hand’s together. It made him cry, but that’s another story for another blog entirely…
