Pencils Now Being Made For Writing On Almost Anything

Bay of Plenty Beacon, Volume 15, Issue 46, 19 May 1950, Page 4

Pencils Now Being Made For Writing On Almost Anything

A pencil to most people is just a pencil, but to the manufacturer it is a very specialised product, especially if, as is now the case, the pencil is to be used for school and civil service examinations. For these a special pencil is used, the electrical conductivity of which is very carefully measured. When these pencils are used to write with it is possible "to distinguish the graphite mark from the mark of aiy other pencil by measuring the electrical resistance over a unit length. Besides undelible pencils, there are now pencils to write on meat, tin, glass, chinaware, and fabrics., Each of these pencils is a specialised product, the result of much, research on the qualities of different types of graphite, or other blended material. The chemist’s understanding of these has made these pencils possible. What nobody can understand, however, is why yellow should be the most popular shade for pencils. During the war there was the utility pencil, with its plain, unpainted wood, but yellow is now the favourite colour, and pencils of this shade disappear from desks more readily than any other.