E "clips"?

In yesterday’s installment, I shared a few late-model Eclipse pencils:

The tie that binds these three – other than the Eclipse brand, are the clips. Each has one unusual and distinctive feature: the tabs which secure the clips to the barrels are not at the tops, but are partway down, leaving a "tail" above the tabs that curls up to (and sometimes over) the tops.

In the last few months, I was attracted to a couple other lesser pencils with share that same feature...

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.

Eclipsed by the Pens?

Later Eclipse models are fun to collect. Right up until the end, Marx Finstone’s gift for gimmickry and a neat turn of phrase lived on in the company’s products, such as these:

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.

Inzane

I try not to be too biased about Zaner-Bloser’s stuff. Being born and raised in central Ohio, Zaner Bloser pencils are a common sight here, and a lot of them are pretty low quality.

But when I saw this one, I said to myself, that’s cool. I don’t care where you’re from, you’ve got to think this is cool:

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.

LIke I Stole It

I don’t have much of a story about or behind this one, but it’s one of the most outstanding Victorian pencils I’ve ever seen:

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.

Eversharp's Worst and Weirdest Idea

No, it wasn’t the ballpoint – that was a good idea poorly executed. It wasn’t the Eversharp 10,000 made during the time Parker was running the show, either – they might have been ugly as sin, but at least they worked..

My vote for the strangest thing Eversharp tried to do – a perfect storm of bad materials, bad engineering and bad marketing, is this:

At first glance, its easy to dismiss this as a later Skyline, until you notice the two most obvious differences: it’s a little bit shorter, and instead of a round barrel, these have a flat, ribbed front surface under the clip. .

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.

Just for Fun . . . But Not Too Much Fun

Pencils like this typically are marked "Everlast" on the clip:

The gold-colored cylinder slides down when the pencil is pointed upwards, revealing what’s inside. This is one of the funnier ones:

"I should have danced all night," it reads. Why? Point the tip skyward and you’ll see . . .

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.

Straight From the Land of Shaw-Barton

As much as I’d like to say that Shaw-Barton’s pencils were all original, they weren’t. Nearly all of the Shaw-Barton pencils I’ve found were made by Ritepoint, probably supplied to Shaw-Barton with the company’s name on the clips, which Shaw-Barton then screen printed with the customer’s advertising.

Nearly all, that is, except for these:

These translucent pencils don’t fit the mold.

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.