Another Dorky Pencil

My daughters have been coming to the Ohio Show with me as long as they can remember, usually just for a couple of hours (not much there to entertain them, since I’m pretty preoccupied throughout the show).

Several years ago, early in my collecting, my primary interest was in finding Eversharp Doric pencils. Many of the examples pictured in The Catalogue came from those early years. When my older daughter was maybe all of nine years old, she came to the Ohio Show and we spent some time roaming around and looking at all the pencils in the room. At one point, she saw an attractive pencil she thought I’d like and excitedly she pointed it out to me. "Daddy, there’s a really nice pencil!" she said.

So we looked at it together. I pointed out all the things I liked about it, and after we’d admired it for a little while, I put it back on the table.

"Aren’t you going to buy it?" she asked me.

"Sweetie, it’s a really nice one," I said, "but it’s not a Doric."

"But Daddy," she said without missing a beat, "I thought all your pencils were dorky."

There wasn’t a person within earshot that didn’t break out laughing at that one – myself included.

Anymore, I don’t buy Doric pencils very often. They are featured on pages 65 to 68 of The Catalogue, and any more I find it difficult to find one that adds much to my display. However, when this one came along, I had to bite . . .

NOTE:  This article is now included in the print version of The Leadhead's Pencil Blog, available anywhere you buy books, or also from The Legendary Lead Company.

To order, here's the link:  Volume 1 at Legendary Lead Company