(No. 1 pencils produce darker markings ... The earliest pencils were made by filling a wood shaft with raw graphite, leading to the need for a trade-wide recognized method of production.

but both are in the general realm of a No. 2/HB-grade core. All of our panelists praised its jet-black, fluid marks. The hexagonal, incense-cedar wood pencil is coated in a glossy, maroon paint.

Carpenters have this amazing ability to see the unrealized potential in a tool, a piece of scrap wood, even a drywall ... mark on the lumber with a pencil (and no square) and cuts on the mark ...

with most manufacturers utilizing the standard wood and graphite combo. But if you've picked up a woodworking pencil before, you no doubt noticed that it was flat instead of the traditional round ...

As the preferred writing utensil to help fill in those bubbles on a standardized test that everyone loves to take, the No ... pieces of wood, eventually evolving into the kind of pencils we ...

Wood passes through the loud whine of saws ... Inside a two-story warehouse, unadorned but for a 25-foot-long No. 2 pencil painted on the outside, nearly 100 employees produce around 72 million ...

There was no easy way to make them ... cut grooves into the wood, apply glue to them." Round pencils still exist, as do triangular and [shudders] rectangular "carpenter" pencils.

The idea to create the massive wood sculpture was hatched about five ... an exact replica of the No.2 pencil many used in school. It's carved out of what remains of the base of the old oak.