page_title: Crayon
section_title: E. Steiger & Co.
hierarchical_section_title: Crayon / American crayon companies / E. Steiger & Co.
caption_attribution_description: English: Original Franklin Mfg. Co. crayons from the collection of Ed Welter
context_page_description: A crayon is a stick of colored wax, charcoal, chalk or other material used for writing or drawing. A crayon made of pigment with a dry binder is a pastel; when made of oiled chalk, it is called an oil pastel. A grease pencil or Chinese marker is made of colored hardened grease. There are also watercolor crayons, sometimes called water-soluble crayons.
  Crayons are available at a range of prices and are easy to work with. They are less messy than most paints and markers, blunt, typically non-toxic, and available in a wide variety of colors. These characteristics make them particularly good instruments for teaching small children to draw in addition to being used widely by student and professional artists.
context_section_description: One of the first companies to offer up a line of wax crayons aimed for kindergarten use. Located out of New York, NY, it is unclear when this company started producing crayons but based on a known ad from 1881, they clearly offered wax crayons in boxes of 6, 12, and 18 colors.
caption: Surviving boxes from Franklin Mfg Co.
exif: {}