Michael Blair wrote:

"Remember them?  I sold them at my grandfather's art and office supply
store.  Those that aren't advertising give away pencils are marked with
their hardness.  Most common hardness is No. 2, followed by No. 2 1/2
(some companies call this one No. 2 A).  I used to get the No.4 pencils
for writing and taking notes because they don't smudge."


Just a bit to add to Michael's comments. One problem with modern office-supply
brands is that they aren't consistent from maker to maker. They are all numbered
#2, but they are all over the place in hardness. I'm more annoyed by the lack of
concentricity of the leads, so that sharpening leaves a long splinter of wood
all the way to the tip; and by the brittleness of modern lead, so that the point
breaks off below the wood before you even finish sharpening.


Artists' pencils do seem the way to go, if you are picky, and actually buy your
pencils (mine seem to appear magically, especially after I visit libraries, or
sometimes on the sidewalk.) It helps if you understand the numbering system,
which is different from ordinary pencils. From a central point labelled "HB" the
numbers rise in two directions, toward H which is hard and therefore pale, and
toward B which is black and therefore soft. The steps are by two numerals, so
that a run from a moderately hard to a moderately black would be 4H - 2H - HB -
2B -4B. I still have a lot of my mother's, and others I bought myself in the
early '80s. The numbers for common-or-sidewalk pencils, back when they meant
anything, seem to have corresponded roughly to the hard side of the
artist's-pencil scale, so that a No.4 was something like a 4H and a No.2
approximated a 2H. I even remember seeing, long ago, yellow hexagonal pencils
labeled "HB".

With artists' pencils you will probably want a push-on eraser or a separate
eraser. The white plastic kind are less abrasive, and they don't leave crumbs of
rubber embedded in the paper. Or, I expect, in the wood. The rubber is bad
because it decays quickly, though I don't recall ever seeing damage I could
blame on that cause. It seems to me that the white plastic ones work better as
well, but I've got no objective basis for that.

Tom Conroy
If you like the kind that are two feet long, and can be tied in knots, I can't
help you. Ask a school kid.

Berkeley