By Rachel Barduson
I’ve been around for a very long time and, quite honestly, I am somewhat of a legend if I do say so myself. I’m kind of a big deal and I have a pretty rich history to prove it.
I am a #2 pencil and I would bet that most of you have had me in your hands. It has been said that I am the “Goldilocks pencil” because I’m “just right.” I fill those little circles perfectly and completely with a nice rich mark, yet, if you change your mind while answering that question on the SAT or the standardized tests you all took in school, or on any of the forms that you have had to fill out throughout your adult life, well – you can still erase the mark. It’s easy to erase my mark, but I’m still around.
I’m still around because I’m a pretty important part of your education, and your day. I’ve been in right hands and left hands. Sometimes my eraser is gone quickly and sometimes I’m sharpened so often that I become too short – too fast.
Pencils have been around for a long, long time. In fact, in the 1500s, according to common legend, “a large deposit of graphite was discovered in England when a storm uprooted it along with a tree. The graphite was pure and solid, perfectly suited for writing, although the only people using it at first were shepherds marking their sheep.” Research has also shown that “an Italian couple named Bernacotti invented the first wooden pencil in 1560. Originally it was an oval shape which stopped the pencil from rolling away and it was mainly used by carpenters at the time. Lead for pencils were only used in the Middle Ages in the form of slate.”
A few centuries later a chemist determined graphite was a form of carbon, not lead, as they originally thought, and that’s why people still refer to what’s in a pencil is lead, even though it’s not. Early on, the graphite was sometimes wrapped in sheepskin or string to make it easier for the writer to hold. The Swiss naturalist Conrad Gessner is credited as being the first person to describe putting graphite into a wooden holder.*
Today, I may not be a #1 pencil but in the grand scheme of things, I really am #1 even though I’ve always been known as #2. I was introduced in 1913 as the yellow No. 2 Ticonderoga pencil. According to history, “Henry David Thoreau’s father John and brother-in-law Charles Dunbar formed a partnership. In 1829, their pencil manufacturing moved to Concord, MA, producing high enough quality to be sold in Boston. At the time, most American-made pencils were dusty, smudgy without necessarily being equally hard, and frequently brittle, throughout the industry. However, Thoreau researched European pencil-making processes and reverse-engineered a better blend of graphite and clay in 1843 and by the mid-19th century, the Thoreau’s were selling pencils with varying graphite hardness, which they numbered 1 through 4.
Many of you know of John Thoreau’s son Henry David Thoreau, who went on to be a famous American naturalist, essayist, poet, and philosopher, best known for his book Walden. Legend has it that Henry may never have built his cabin at Walden Pond, or written his classic book, if it weren’t for Ralph Waldo Emerson, his mentor, friend, and fellow nature writer...and...Thoreau’s manufactured pencil. In fact, Emerson wrote, “it appears they invented a process, very simple, but which at once put their black lead for fineness at the head of all manufactured in America. This was simply to have the narrow churn-like chamber around the mill-stones prolonged some seven feet high, opening into a broad, close, flat box, a sort of shelf. Only lead-dust that was fine enough to rise to that height, carried by an upward draught of air, and lodge in the box was used, and the rest ground over.” Honestly, just like Ralph Waldo Emerson’s influence on Henry, maybe Henry’s book wouldn’t have been written without me.
But, back to today, and this particular essay being about me, the #2 pencil. I am made of a graphite and clay mixture, so, if you have ever wondered why you didn’t die when you chewed on me, well, there was never any lead in me. Also, this is why your classmate didn’t come down with lead poisoning when you accidentally stabbed him or her in the fourth grade. I am yellow and hexagonal with a pink eraser at one end. “A Czech company is credited with starting this trend at the World’s Fair in 1889, painting its pencils containing fine graphite from the Far East. The yellow color, traditionally associated with royalty in China, was meant to portray the pencils as a luxury item. Other pencil makers quickly followed suit.”
My pink eraser has a story of its own. Before rubber erasers came along, some people further back in history than I can even remember used crustless bread as erasers. Others used wax or bits of stone. In the 19th century people figured out how to cure raw rubber and make it durable, thus beginning the rubber eraser’s current reign. A Philadelphia man patented his idea to attach an eraser to the end of a pencil, but the patent was later invalidated since it was just two existing products stuck together.
One thing was certain: you needed me and my #2 status with an eraser when you took your standardized tests, your SAT and your ACT. I am perhaps one of the most important school supply items that teachers request of their students, or I guess, of their student’s parents. Yet, I know I’m not the only one on the list of supplies that are needed for the new school year. There are a lot of other pencils and things for writing. I am often overshadowed by bright, colorful markers and pencils and highlighters and pens. I remember when a new phenomenon – the Bic pen - came on the market. In 1950 Marcel Bich launched his ballpoint pen in France under the BIC brand and I thought to myself, here is another new fad to challenge me. Yet, I think I’m still #1 – even though I will always be #2.
Ah, yes...new and improved trends in writing tools have evolved over the years. Oh, I know that there are pencils with higher numbers that have different uses – a higher number means they have harder “leads.” They are used by engineers, architects, and draftsmen because of their harder points. Pencils that have lower numbers than me are often used by artists because they can help create a variety of shades and tones that are needed to create their work of art. Am I worried about being replaced by typewriters, computer keyboards and new-fangled trends that keep coming out in the market? Not for one minute. We can all work together. I am not worried about losing my importance or of fading into oblivion.
I will always be needed by teachers and students and parents and a population of people who need a softer “lead” with an eraser on the other end.
And THAT, my friend, is my final confession.
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