Made of reforested cedar wood, these pencils are easy to sharpen with an exclusive graphite-core formula that allows for extra smooth performance.
Pencils can be made from different types of wood, however Ticonderogas are made from California Incense-Cedar.
"Ticonderoga pencils are produced with premium wood from certified sustainable wood sources," says Becky Trudeau, a product manager at Dixon Ticonderoga. "Exacting standards are used to produce pencils that write smoothly, without the scratchy feel of other pencil brands, and deliver consistent results.
There is no difference between a Dixon Ticonderoga wooden pencil with a black barrel and one with a yellow barrel apart from the color. They are both Ticonderoga branded and therefore made from cedar wood it just that the black pencil has been dyed black as opposed to having a yellow lacquered finish.
Ticonderoga® has a tradition of fine quality writing instruments in the US for over 100 years. The exclusive graphite core features a proprietary formula focusing on graphite mined from carefully controlled sources to deliver extra smooth performance.
Since its founding, Dixon Ticonderoga has found ways to mass produce pencils and perfect the composition of graphite, not lead, that makes up the charcoal tip.
The name "Ticonderoga" was derived from an Iroquois word meaning "between two waters," or "where the waters meet." With the fort now under their control, the British renamed it Fort Ticonderoga.
Recognizing in 1876 the errors of other people's ways, the company attached erasers to the pencils. Sixty years later the product was given the name of Ticonderoga, in honor of the New York State town where the Dixon Company has graphite mines.
$72.00 – $132.00. Ticonderoga® has a tradition of fine quality writing instruments in the US for over 100 years. The exclusive graphite core features a proprietary formula focusing on graphite mined from carefully controlled sources to deliver extra smooth performance.
The main difference between the Ticonderoga “Black” compared to its more mainstream sibling is, obviously, that they are painted with a black lacquer instead of a yellow one.
Dixon was acquired by an Italian company in 2005 and now manufactures most (if not all) of its Ticonderoga pencils in Mexico and China, according to a 2018 investigation by the Washington Post.
The biggest virtue of a wooden pencil is that, well, it's not made out of plastic. That means it takes less energy to produce the raw pencil material. Over time, the wooden pencil will eventually become a pile of shavings that can hypothetically be composted.
Graphite is relatively nonpoisonous. There may be no symptoms. If symptoms do occur, they may include stomachache and vomiting, which could be from a bowel obstruction (blockage). The person may choke while swallowing the pencil.
According to Dictionary.com, early machines that scanned and recorded test scores couldn't properly detect marks made by hard pencils. While No. 1 -- the softest -- pencils were prone to smudging, the No. 2 pencil was the perfect balance of softness and hardness.
1866. Despite having been introduced in 1829, it wasn't until the Civil War – when soldiers were seeking a more practical alternative to the quill pen for writing home – that the pencil became widely adopted. Rising demand promoted Dixon to invent a machine capable of producing 132 pencils per minute.
Since it's emergence in the late 1800's, the Ticonderoga pencil became and remains a familiar product that seems to come fully loaded with bonafide built-in Made In The USA quality and persona.
However, Truby found the last two surviving “Made in the USA” Pencil Companies: General Pencil Company (circa 1889) and the Musgrave Pencil Company (circa 1916). Internationally, the German Company Faber Castell still makes high quality pencils and erasers. America's best-selling brand is Ticonderoga.
Because they were cheaper, even if they were toxic. But, you certainly wouldn't want to suck on a "lead" pencil if it really had lead in it. In fact, lead pencils became extinct only in the early 20th century. The modern lead pencil is a very nice technology.
Here's a myth buster: There is no lead in pencils. Rather, the core is made up of a non-toxic mineral called graphite. The common name “pencil lead” is due to an historic association with the stylus made of lead in ancient Roman times.
This may come as a shock to some people but lead pencils do not contain any lead. Never did. The “lead” actually is a mixture of graphite and clay; the more graphite, the softer and darker the point.
The one thing that is agreed upon is that in the late 1800s, when people started painting pencils, the finest graphite in the world was coming from China. And so yellow became a color that was associated with a pencil because it was a way of indicating that your pencil was made with superior Chinese graphite.
The degree of hardness of a pencil is printed on the pencil.
The degrees of hardness of pencils are roughly divided into four groups: B stands for "black". These pencils are soft. H stands for "hard". HB stands for "hard black", which means "medium hard".
Lead pencils are graded on a scale from No. 1 to No. 4 based on how much graphite is inside the core. The #1 pencils are the softest, while the #4 pencils are the hardest.