Craig Herrington was Scout leader, camper

Up until his last day of hospice care in his Mounds View home, Craig Herrington, 86, did what he loved: talking and joking with friends and family.

For two of his last three days, "people were streaming in and out until midnight. He loved it," said daughter Phyllis Giles, of Tampa Fla. "There would be eight or nine people telling jokes and laughing in his bedroom. ... He was very welcoming and accepting of people. ... He was one of the best bear hug-givers in the world."

Herrington, a Boy Scout troop leader and 3M supervisor, died of kidney failure June 17.

He was an Air Force plane mechanic during World War II. After attending the University of Minnesota, he worked for 3M for 32 years, where he retired as senior design supervisor in the roofing materials area, Giles said.

Every summer he would pack up his wife and three kids, hook up his home-made trailer and head off, usually to the West, for camping trips.

"He and Mom would see the brown history signs and stop and read every one," Giles said. "I remember in Yellowstone [National Park], we spent the night sleeping in our Rambler because there were grizzlies in the campground. They came and sniffed at our window."

Her sister, Liz Herrington of Afton, added: "Another night they were sniffing us through the tent."

"He was an incredible knot-tying expert," she said. "He had knots to keep the tent up, a knot for the clothesline, and one to keep the canoe on the car roof."

He loved fishing and canoeing with friends in the Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness. He taught Scouts how to bake and cook over campfires and was known for his chili and his Scout leaders-only campfire cake, a pineupple upside-down cake made with a shot of alcohol, Liz Herrington said.

He was a craftsman who built large kites for his kids, doll houses for his granddaughters and model airplanes for himself and others. "His planes were precise and gorgeous and impeccable, and they flew, too," she said.

He taught her to paint and wallpaper and had an artistic sense of what colors and textures went together inside and outdoors.

"He had classy tastes; you could see it in his airplanes," said Liz Herrington, who has a landscape design business.

"He was a lovable, outgoing person who liked people," Agness said. "Everyone in my church loved him."

Besides his daughters, Herrington is survived by a son, Paul Caruso, of Castle Danger, Minn.; a brother, Jim, of New Brighton, and seven grandchildren.