Vintage metallic colored pencils are pretty cool and quite rare. This Eagle Radiolite is a great example.

Other examples of Canadian pencils with metallic paint were the Venus Lustro, Eberhard Faber Tinsel Tint, and the Dixon Nu-Glo and Semi-Glo.  All quite rare and hard to find.

The Radiolite name probably came from the popular wrist watches of the 1920s and 1930s (such as the Ingersoll Radiolite watch) whose hands were painted with radium to make them glow in the dark.  These pencils don't glow in the dark and don't have radioactive elements in the paint either... just lead in the paint!

An interesting post about these watches stated that they were popular gifts to servicemen on the front lines of World War1, "Because they were so essential for safety, glow-in-the-dark wrist- watches became a popular gift to send to loved ones in service. The adverts for these were pushed particularly hard at Christmastime: ‘Not only will a reliable watch afford him good service, but it will prove a real companion and friend.’ "

The 111th Grey Cup is being played today to decide the Canadian Football League (CFL) championship for the 2024 season. The Winnipeg Blue Bombers are competing against the Toronto Argonauts. A great sporting even like this deserves a great pencil. Eberhard Faber Pencil Co. of Canada made these Grey Cup pencils probably in the 1950s or 1960s. I'm not sure of the significance of the number 1921 on the pencil. The 1921 Grey Cup pitted the Toronto Argonauts against the Edmonton Eskimos with the Argonauts coming out victorious.

The pencils and card with the price in this picture are from an eBay auction quite a number of years ago (an auction that I didn't win). These are a pretty rare item.

I recently purchaed this vintage X-acto set. It is nearly complete with all of its original components. It is stamped with the name of the Canadian company that sold it, Hughes-Owens. Hughes-Owens started prior to 1900 as a manufacturer and distributor of  enginnering and surveying tools. They sold slide-rules, drafting sets, levels, etc. This set probably came from the Halifax store, on Hollis St,  sometime around the 1950s (see below an image from a 1951 catalog). 

I thought, "what a great pencil sharpening kit!" The block planer and the spokeshave remind me of the Høvel pencil plane.   The regular hobby knife would actually be easier to use but it would be fun to give it a try. Perhaps I should start an artisinal pencil sharpening business like David Rees, author of How to Sharpen Pencils. My favorite comment on the linked video ​is, "I've never seen the line between serious and satire toed so masterfully."

The journey started in Quebec and went all across the country. (There was also a side trip to Washington, D.C.) They travelled by train, plane, car and ship and covered an estimated 15,000 miles.

I highly recommend the National Film Board of Canada documentary titled Royal Journey. The film documents the five-week visit of Princess Elizabeth and the Duke of Edinburgh to Canada and the United States in the fall of 1951.
​https://www.nfb.ca/film/royal_journey/

Yesterday, I dropped into a local vintage show and was surprised to find a nice box of Eberhard Faber pencils. It is not often that I attend shows like this and even more rare to see pencils there.  In Canada, these were sold in a gold box while in the US, the box was more commonly silver. This box is showing its age on the outside but the inside still looks great. As the Eberhard Faber factory didn't open in Acton Vale until 1951, we can probably date these pencils to the 1950s or early 1960s. As ballpoint pens, such as the Bic Crystal, were becoming popular in the 1950s, this pencil was probably short lived.

Below are other packages for the set of 8 pencils.

Summer means a chance to travel and enjoy the outdoors. The two 5" x 8" notebooks evoke the camping vibe in a remarkably similar way. Both feature the same basic scene from two perspectives. I wonder if the artist was the same or if they were inspired by the same reference image?  I'm sure there is an interesting story to be told here.

The Camp Fire note book is definitely the older notebook design. I found an description of this notebook in the W.J. Gage Stationery catalogue from 1911. The number given in this catalog is No. 27 and the number on my notebook is No. 3327.  The Hilroy company was not established until 1918 (they celebrated their 100th anniversary in 2018).

While these two note books are quite old, the camping theme continues. Field Notes also makes a set of small campfire notebooks. These limited edition notebooks even came with a patch. I wonder if there are any other camping themed notebooks I could add to this tiny collection?

This mini-collection reminds me of "A Collection a Day" from  Lisa Congdon.

Powis Brothers was a stationery and office supply store that was established in Ottawa, Ontario in 1933. It continued operating for many years, at least until the 1980s. In later years, the store was named Powis Stationery, Inc. and changed to an online store. This pencil has their store name on it but also "Senator 2370". I believe this pencil was made by Venus Canada as there is are several American Pencil Company pencils with the name Senator.

Another Canadian made Senator pencil is shown below. It has a different number but might also have been made by Venus. This one is a bit of a mystery pencil.

The William Cane and Sons Company Ltd. was the first company (that I'm aware of) that manufactured pencils in Canada. William Cane was Newmarket, Ontario's first mayor and a successful entrepreneur. He begain a woodenware factory in Newmarket in the late 1870s or early 1880s. William died in May 1899 and his son, Henry S. Cane took over the family business. It wasn't until the outbreak of World War 1 that this company began to embark in the pencil business. Prior to WW1, high quality and low cost pencils from Austria and Bavaria were popular in Canada. During the war, these pencils became scarce. To capitalize on this opportunity, Cane's began to make pencils for the domestic Canadian market. By 1918, a number of different styles of pencils were being manufactured and advertised in Canadian trade journals such as the Bookseller & Stationer and Office Equipment Journal. These pencils were manufactured until the late 1920s when the company fell on some hard times. Eventually, in 1931, the pencil manufacturing part of the woodenware business was sold to Dixon Pencil Company and a Canadian subsidiery of the US pencil company was created. Dixon continued making pencils in the old Cane's factory until it closed in 1990.

These pencils are increadibly rare and until recently I have only seen advertisements, never an actual pencil. There were made in relatively small numbers for only about ten years. These pencils are a historic example of Canadian industry. I feel like these pencils are true museum pieces. The close up of the paper band shown below contains images of Canadian industry and transportation.

During the mid-1950s (1955-1957), Dixon Canada made pencils honoring hockey players from the Toronto Maple Leafs and the Montreal Canadiens (two of the original six NHL teams and the only two Canadian Hockey teams during that era). It is difficult to find records from that time but it appears that Dixon made sets of twelve pencils picturing players from the 1955-56 and 1956-57 seasons. Individual pencils from these sets show up quite frequently on eBay. Individual pencils sell for between $25 and $250 depending on the player. Complete sets are quite rare and expensive. 

​There is currently a set of Toronto Maple Leaf pencils on eBay. This set of 12 pencils is in very good condition. The price seems expensive but is in line with past auctions for similar sets of pencils.

Players in this specific set include: Barry Cullen, Brian Cullen, Jim Thompson, Jim Morrison, Tod Sloan, Earl Balfour, Gary Aldcorn, Ed Chadwick, Bob Pulford, Sid Smith, Gerry James & Marc Reaume.  These players were all on the Maple Leafs during either the 1955-56 or 1956-57.

There are pencils for numerous other plays available as well. I'm not sure if each set had a random grouping or if the players being printed changed over time. 

Sports pencils are highly collectible. In the football realm, I've seen a set of Grey Cup pencils produced by Eberhard Faber in Canada. It was a set of two pencils, one in white and one in blue, not for a specific team but just for the championship.