What is National Pencil Day?
Each year, the writing utensil is commemorated on National Pencil Day, which has achieved more than just teach millions of the alphabet and draw straight lines. It's also helped win wars and spawned amazing art.
On this day in 1858, Hymen Lipman received the first patent for attaching an eraser to the end of a pencil. Pencils and erasers existed separately before that time. Lipman combined the two making the two devices much more convenient to use. The intuitive businessman also made envelopes for his stationery shop and was the first to apply adhesive to envelope flaps.
World war ii pencils
Cumberland Pencil Company, a Cumberland Pencil Company based out of Kenswick, England, manufactured pencils that were supposed to work during World War II. On either end, the pencils were hollow with graphite. The designers had stowed maps to assist rescued military personnel in their emigration to freedom between the graphite and the liberation of prisoners. Charles Fraser Smith designed them in 1942, and at night, when the factory closed, workers would assemble them under secrecy. The miniature maps detailed escape routes from war camps' prisoner to war camps, as well as a miniature compass. These tiny arms were distributed to Royal Airforce members and sent to POW camps throughout the war.
