The Velvet was a pencil that was made by Venus during the entire time that the company existed in Canada. It it really interested to see how the advertising, packaging and imprint changes over the decades.

These pencils often come up for sale on eBay and they are not cheap. I shared a complete set of Toronto Maple Leafs pencils a few years ago that was selling for $2500 US. It took a while but the set finally sold. As they were only sold for a couple of years they are quite rare.

I recently picked up a lot of vintage Canadian pencils with brown ferrules at a thrift shop. They were mostly Pedigree pencils with a few Berol Valor and Delta Hotels pencils. The Valor and Delta Hotels pencils looked like identical ferrules. I wonder if they were both made by Berol. When these pencils were made, I think Empire owned Berol in Canada (Empire Pencil bought the Berol Pencil Company in early 1987). Delta Hotels started in British Columbia in the 1960s and then expanded to Ontario in the late 1970s. I suspect these pencils are from the late 1980s or 1990s.

The Reliable Toy Company, headquartered in Toronto, Ontario was one of the largest toy makers in Canada. They are best known for their injection molded plastic toys from the post-WW2 era.  I didn't realize that they also made a few stationery items. Below is a pencil box I recently saw on Facebook from an antique store in Yarmouth, NS. A little digging led me to a 1958 Reliable Toy catalog with this same pencil box listed.

I also saw on Facebook a Reliable plastic ruler.  I have no idea when these were made and I've never seen another one. The telephone number "Gladstone 7551" appears to have been in use during the 1950s.

Some very interested and rare bits of Canadian history. 

Eaton's was a Canadian department store chain with stores across the country. Like many large historic department stores, both in Canada and the US, it did not adapt well to the changing retail environment and closed in 1999. During later half of the twentieth century, Eaton's sold store branded APSCO pencil sharpeners. The two sharpeners below are an APSCO Midget (left) and APSCO Giant (right). Both were probably made in Canada. 

I have yet to find any Eaton's branded pencils to add to my collection of retail store pencils. The hunt, as ever, continues.

This Popeye Pencil Case made by Hassenfeld Bros. This set was made in the US but quite likely sold in Canada.  Hassenfeld Brothers expanded to Canada with Hassenfeld Brothers (Canada) Ltd. in 1961 and was located in Longueuil, Quebec. In 1968 the company shortened its name to Hasbro. I think this case dates probably from the 1960s.

The contents on the top are not all original to the case.  It is hard to say exactly what this case came with. The eraser and the Sunset color pencils, made by Empire pencil which was owned by Hassenfeld Bros., were likely part of the original set. It probably also came with some pencils and a plastic ruler.

This case has two drawers in the side. The top drawer often had some sort of paper storage and the bottom drawer had water color paints. It is great to see the water color paints still in this case as well as a couple of brushes and a mini water dish. The brushes were made in Japan. Not sure if they are original to the set or not. The small metal water dish was definitley part of this set. 

The most exciting part of this pencil case for me was this Eagle Rocket 84 pencil. Not an original part of this case but a rare and hard to find pencil from the same time period.  It appears to be knife sharpened... the sign of a pencil that probably hasn't been used in a few decades.

Ink blotters advertising Canadian pencils are quite rare. I recently added this one to my collection. It is from Lewis Stationery Company Ltd in Calgary, Alberta. Given the 1 letter plus 4 digit format of the phone number, I'm guessing that this comes from the 1940s. The Lewis Stationery Company appears to have been founded by James Lewis in the 1930s and continued on well into the 1970s. 

The pencil shown on this ink blotter is just like some of the older Ticonderoga's in my collection. This same type of pencil and band are shown in the advertisement from Canadian Stationer from May, 1946. All three of these items refer to the Dixon Ticonderoga is "The Business Pencil." 

The Venus Pencil Company of Canada made a number of different copying pencils. The No. 165 came in five different degrees from Soft to Extra Hard. It also came with a point protector, mouthpiece or in a "pocket style". Vintage copying pencils are known to contain aniline dyes, which are quite toxic, so even with a mouthpiece I would be hesitent to hold this pencil in my mouth! These pencils have the same crackle finish that Venus Drawing pencils have. The difference is that these are in a blue colour instead of green.

Below are four pristine sets of 12 Eagle/Berol Canadiana colored pencils. They span about two decades of time. The final Berol set mixes up the colors and removed white and lavendar and replaces them with champagne and purple. Eagle was the best selling pencil brand in Canada during much of this time period but Laurentian colored pencils from Venus seemed to be the more popular colored pencil for students.

During the year 1935, Dixon launched a nation-wide advertising campaign for the Dixon Chancellor pencil. These ads highlighted the fact that this was a Canadian made pencil using Canadian graphite. The ads have a distinctly nationalistic sentiment. I think that looking at these ads through the lens of the political and societal backdrop of the day is revealing.

In 1935, Canada was still firmly in the grip of the great depression. Unemployment was  high and consumer confidence was low. Authoriatarianism and Fascism was on the rise globally. Hitler was firmly in power in Germany and Mousalini was about to embark on the invasion of Ethiopia. Japan was increasingly nationalistic and militarized. In short, the promise of a world at peace at the end of World War 1, "the war to end all wars", was looking extremely precarious. In Canada, the World War 1 documentary "Lest We Forget" was released. 

With the possibility of war with Germany on the horizon, the film highlighted the tragedy of war and futility of conflict. "Lest We Forget played for a year in Canadian theatres and grossed $34,000. The footage it used is a staple of Canadian war films and documentaries to this day." according to War Art in Canada. 

from The Border Cities Star, Windsor, Ontario, March 8th, 1935
Ottawa Views War Picture "LEST WE FORGET" - Parliament Rises to Attend Propaganda Film
  OTTAWA, March 8. — Canada's legislative machinery was silenced last night as the leaders of the nation, rising early from their law-making duties, proceeded en masse to view a motion picture. The Governor General and Lady Bessborough, members of the Dominion cabinet, distinguished Parliamentarians, representatives of church and state crowded to witness the premiere showing of Canada's anti-war picture, "Lest We Forget."
  Sponsored by the Canadian Legion in an effort to portray the tragic futility of war and to bring home through the visible sense the stupidity and folly of armed conflict, the picture is a product of the Canadian Government Motion Picture Bureau, secured from the reservoir of film which, taken during the tragic years from 1914 to 1918, now rests in the treasury.
  It was not in the words of Brig. Gen. Alex Ross, Dominion president of the Legion, who spoke briefly before the picture opened, a performance that was not a social event but a solemn occasion, long desired by the veteran body of Canada, which has felt it necessary that war should be portrayed in all its stark reality.
  "We feel that such an impression should be attended with all due ceremony in accordance with the British tradition, that those who have sacrificed in the cause of King and Country shall be accorded every honour which a grateful country can bestow, and the manner had inaugurated this picture in any other manner we would have failed in the observance of this tradition, and would have been untrue to the memory of those whom it seeks to honour for the sacrifice they made."
  The picture itself comprehends in one wide sweep the origins of the conflict and narrows down to Canada's participation, to tell the story of the Canadian corps, its achievements, its joys and sorrows, and in the final scenes searches the heart for the answer to the question if the last conflict was "a war to end war."
  The theatre was crowded with officers from all works of the city, with all of the Ottawa garrison attending in full mess kit.

from the Drummondville Statesman, January 8, 1935
Even Cabinet Members Have Film Trouble
Naming of Picture of Canada's War-Time Activities Proves Brain Twister for Full Gathering of Ministers.
  Ottawa. — While the Government may not be said to have "gone Hollywood," it is nevertheless true that cabinet ministers now appreciate the problems attendant upon evolving a title for a moving picture. A recent meeting of the Privy Council beheld the unusual spectacle of the nation's administrators seriously worried and scratching their pencils as they tried out various titles for the film depicting Canada's part in the war, under Government sanction. Finally an inspiration struck the cabinet, and "Lest We Forget" was born and approved.
  And so "Lest We Forget" is the name of the picture compiled from many thousands of feet of film taken overseas during the war, and trimmed into a connected and coherent story of Canada's war effort. It is designed to bring home to the Canadian public the stupidity and fruitlessness of war. The picture is being presented and will have its premiere early in the New Year under the auspices of the Canadian Legion.
  For more than a year an inter-departmental committee, headed by Major-General A. G. L. McNaughton, C.B., has been working on the film, selecting and identifying the innumerable sequences. The result is a production, of feature length, dividing the war into three periods. "Part one" will embrace the picture of the Grand Duke Michael Ferdinand at Sarajevo to the arrival of the Canadians in France, the battles at Ypres, April 1915, to the Somme, September 1916 and the Vimy Ridge, April, 1917, with side incursions to naval actions at Coronel, the Falkland Islands and the Dogger Bank, to Plug-Street, Sanctuary Wood and Passchendaele, and Canada's "Hundred Days" from Amiens, August 1918 to the end.
  In all sequences the cost of war is vividly illustrated.
  Work of the picture has been proceeding for more than a year. It is with Captain F. O. Badgley, director of the Government Motion Picture Bureau, receiving warm co-operation from authorities in London, Paris, Rome and Washington.