The "R"

A little more than a year ago, I posted an article here about a mysterious pencil marked "R.M. & Co." that was a dead ringer for an early Mabie Todd ("Probably Mabie . . . Maybe" at http://leadheadpencils.blogspot.com/2013/09/probably-mabie-maybe.html):

I had speculated that the "M" was "Mabie," as in John Mabie, and that the "R" might have been John Rauch, one of America’s earliest pencil manufacturers. Mabie apprenticed with Rauch during the early 1840s, and there’s no evidence that there was anything adversarial about the younger John’s decision to move on and start his own shop. It may seem like an obvious conclusion that the "R" stood for Rauch, but there was a reason I hesitated: none of the Rauch-marked pencils I’d seen look anything like a Mabie Todd . . .

To learn more, this full article is included in The Leadhead's Pencil Blog Volume 3, available at Amazon, Barnes & Noble and everywhere else you buy books, or you can order a copy signed by yours truly through the Legendary Lead Company HERE.