Art Fry was singing in the choir when the thought struck him to put some glue onto the back of a piece of paper to form a better book mark (it stays!).  He tried it out by using Spencer Silver’s newly discovered adhesive that formed clear, sparkly spheres instead of a film.  In 1974 Fry introduced his new creation to Bob Molenda, Fry’s supervisor and projects lab coordinator, and the two acknowledged the immense amount of potential within this invention.  They named it the Post-It Note.
Marketing directors of 3M and others gave samples to many offices to try out using the Post-It Note—which they soon fell in love with—and Boise, Idaho became chosen as the ideal spot for a Post-It boom.  The Boise blitz was an absolute success, and it is this event that led E. Lynn Wilson to introduce the Post-It Note to the rest of the world.  Thanks to all of these people we now have access to those yellow sticky pads that go on our refrigerators, our notebooks, bulletin boards—everywhere.

*Pictures fromhttp://multimedia.mmm.com/mws/mediawebserver.dyn?PPPPPPyw
H01P3sQPbsQPPPD0R0S5555n- and http://multimedia.mmm.com/
mws/mediawebserver.dyn?7777771amfi7oYv7HYv777ItAf8uuuuT-, respectively

Sources:
3M. Pop-up Black Standard. <http://multimedia.mmm.com/mws/mediawebserver.dyn?PPPPPPyw
H01P3sQPbsQPPPD0R0S5555n->

3M United States. The Players. 12 Oct 2003. <http://www.3m.com/us/office/postit/learn_history_players.jhtml>

3M. 3X3 Yellow Pad. 12 Oct 2003. <http://multimedia.mmm.com/mws/mediawebserver.dyn?
7777771amfi7oYv7HYv777ItAf8uuuuT->

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