Blue Crayon

Made of a mixture of charcoal and oil, records of what were probably the first crayons are found in Europe. Later, the oil was replaced with wax making sticks that were less messy and easier to handle.

In 1903, Binney & Smith realized that if they made a few changes to the crayon they developed for marking crates, they could provide a less messy alternative to the crayons used in their public schools at that time. Binney & Smith tasked a chemist of their company to work at creating crayons that would be both non-toxic and easily mass produced. Binney & Smith were successful in the endeavor to create crayons that would work well for a young school children and soon the cousins were selling a box of eight crayons for about a nickel under the trade name of Crayola. The first box contained the colors red, orange, yellow, green, blue, violet, brown and black. Forty years later there was forty more colors added to the color pallette. By the seventies fluorescent colors were added to the line up which brought the number of colors available up to seventy-two.

Today, there are approximately 120 colors of crayons currently available. Some have glow in the dark properties, some are scratch and sniff, some change colors when used on paper, others have glitter combined with the crayola crayons wax in such a way as to allow drawing made with glitter crayons to glisten in the sunlight. From a parenting perspective, the easy wash off the walls formula is a scientific breakthrough of phenomenal proportions.

Binney & Smith were two men who cared about the world around us and in particular they were concerned with making the schools of the early 20th century safer and more productive for the children and teachers of that generation. Binney & Smith has been faced with competition recently from other manufacturers of crayons. However, Binney & Smith have the history of meeting the challenges of creating tools to embrace and encourage creativity and education.

There are not too many people who can say they haven't been raised to utilize and recognize the Crayola crayons. In fact, the Binney & Smith company have noted that studies show that approximately 98% of American consumers recognize the brand of crayola crayons. Are you one of them?