The Republican. [volume] (Oakland, Md.) 1877-current, 1878-12-07
Black Lead Pencils.

The use of black lead for writing an(
drawing is of obscure origin; for the
references to something which may OF
may not have been black lead pencil
by Van Eyck about the beginning of the
fifteenth century, by M. Emmling, 6
little later, and by Italian writers some.
what earlier, are very uncertain. Black
lead is believed to have a vegetable
origin, perhaps the remains in the pri.
mary rock of some vegetation which ex-
listed when those rocks were at the sur.
face of the earth, just as the anthracite
and bituminous coal deposits are the
remains of the vegetation of subse-
quent geological period.
1t was in the year 1864 that the cele-
brated English mine of Borrowdale, in
Cumberland, was discovered, and in the
following year the first pencils were
made from it. The black lead from
this mine used to be taken out with as
much precaution as if it had been dia-
mond; in fact, it was worth more than
any ordinary diamond mine, for it used
to produce from S150,000 to $780, 900
annually, the mining of it being con-
fined to only six weeks in the year. The
crude Jumps or blocks, in the course of
manufacture, were. scraped clean and
sawed into plates of the thickness of a
pencil lead, then a grooved stick was
taken, one edge of this plate set in at
one end and broken across even with
the groove; then the plate was laid into
the groove again, close to the end of
the first piece, and again broken across,
and so on until the groove was filled,
when piece of wood was glued on
above it, and the pencil rounded into
shape.
The processes used in manufactures
now are much more scientific than the
rude method described as employed
with the Cumberland mine, one manu-
factory alone in the United States en-
ploying twenty-eight different patents
greater portion of black lead or graphite
used in this country is obtained from
Georgia. The number of different styles
of pencils called for by the public, from
the commonest school pencil up to the
very finest grade for artists, is surpris-
ing. Including several styles of colored
pencils or crayons, there are manufac-
tured 800 different sorts of pencils,
fourteen of which are made into black
lead pencils.
In describing the operations which
result in lead pencil as manufactured
to-day, it will be convenient to begin
with the experiences through which the
black lead is carried. Black lead is a
soft, crumbly black powder, with Jumps
all throughit having its own well-known
peculiar greasy feeling and gloss. This
is refined by being mixed with water in
a series of tanks, where it is stirred and
left to settle, transferred and stirred
and settled again, over and over, the
impurities being gradually thrown out
and the lead itself assorted by quanti-
ties. When this is done about one
fourth of the original has been rejected
as grit, earth, etc. The remainder is
scooped into shallow saucers of pottery,
like those used for hower-pots, but of a
larger size, measuring, say, ten inches
across; and in these, like so many mud
pies, the precious stuff Is placed in q
drying-room kept at 120 degrees Fab
renheit until the moisture is thoroughly
driven off. They are then crushed in a
dry mill, transferred again into heavy
muller in a circular trough, where it is
mixed with different but finer-grained
mud, which gives it remarkable tenac-
ity.
This mass is then subjected to the ac-
ton of three-hundred-ton power screw
press, under which it finds no escape
for its agony except in spirting out
through one small hole provided for it
in little solid brass die about as large
as a thimble. The hole of this die is
the shape and size of the lead-square,
hexagonal or oval, large or small, as
the case may be. OF these dies there are