Talk:Crayon

There is no place named Butenseken in Sweden. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Siriusv (talk • contribs) 05:09, 11 May 2009 (UTC)

pronunciation

I fixed the pronunciation.

If you changed it to what it currently is, "ˈkɹei.ən," then you did not fix it. It's "CRAY-on." "On" is pronounced like the word "on." Not a schwa. 128.211.198.168 (talk) 05:16, 6 February 2010 (UTC)

photo

The photo of the little girl doesn't actually add ANY information about crayons. she's not even holding one in her hand (which would at least show how people draw with them), and we can't see her paper. Better photo anyone? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 75.69.242.101 (talk) 17:47, 27 December 2009 (UTC)

I can blow you away with photos if I knew how to add them (help?). I can provide whatever photos you want; I have many of the original boxes and crayons from a multitude of crayon manufacturers going back to the late 1800s. I agree; let's get some better pictures on here. Ed Welter (talk) 05:34, 28 January 2010 (UTC)Ed Welter

Check out Help:Contents/Images and media for a bunch of topics on how to upload and insert images into articles. Note that the biggest thing to be careful of is making sure images you upload are tagged properly or it's likely someone will request that they be deleted. If the images are in the public domain (which I imagine might be true of really old box artwork), you might want to consider uploading them to Wikimedia Commons so that they can be used outside of wikipedia. PaleAqua (talk) 20:24, 30 January 2010 (UTC)

Boogers removed

I have just removed and fixed the following extra information:

sticking in your nose to get out boogers,
is actually found to be made out of people and
, elephants, fairy princesses, and X-men.
a nickel

What would Wikipedia be without a little fun =) .. I haven't checked the factual accuracy of the rest of the article though. --=8)-DX (talk) 23:35, 6 October 2009 (UTC)

Room for improvement

This article is way too short. It should include more about the histories of dyes, multiple manufacturers of crayons, as well as the toxicity of crayons. Start listing your ideas on how to expand this article in this section of the discussion page. Crayonsman (talk) 01:47, 18 December 2009 (UTC)

Hello, Crayonsman. I thought you had quit editing Wikipedia -- I guess you changed your mind. Since you're the expert on crayons, why don't YOU start listing your ideas about the article rather than seeming to pass the buck to other people? Timothy Perper (talk) 09:23, 18 December 2009 (UTC)

I have no further interest in *editing* Wikipedia. Crayonsman (talk) 16:54, 19 December 2009 (UTC)

Sounds like a nice start on what to work on. I took an initial stab at the toxicity though I added it to the history section instead of a new toxicity section since all the sources seemed to indicate it as a non issue, and any changes were just to be safe. What about famous paintings done in crayon, and influences on our culture like crayon physics, or the tendency for some TV shows, movies and comics to use sequences in crayon to indicate childhood flash backs? I'll try to do some digging when I have the time. (note I'm a bit of a sloth so don't expect me to be fast.) PaleAqua (talk) 20:32, 19 December 2009 (UTC)

Crayon safety

Moved discussion from "Keep it is" thread at Talk:List of Crayola crayon colors that probably applies more to this page that that one about the potential toxicity of crayons. This source ""CPSC Staff Report on Asbestos Fibers in Children's Crayons" (PDF). U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission. August 2000. Retrieved 2009-11-18." seems to indicate that while fibers have been found they are of little risk. The original of the Seattle Post-Intelligencer article mentioned in the thread can be found at [1]. More CPSC reports can be found at [2], but did not see any follow ups beyond the August 2000 one where they labeled the risk as insignificant. There were also the concerns in around 1994-1995 of some crayons imported into the U.S. containing lead, see [3] for example. PaleAqua (talk) 20:43, 18 December 2009 (UTC)

Thanks for digging up these files. The CPSC report concluded (p.8) that risk to a child by inhalation or ingestion was very low -- meaning while the kid is drawing. Even so, the CPSC report recommended (p. 8) that all asbestos be removed from crayons. On p. 8, the report also says their staff asked Binney & Smith, the mfrs of Crayolas, and Ticonderoga Dixon, another crayon mfr, to remove the asbestos, and both companies agreed. Has there been nothing after the year 2000 on the removal of asbestos? I'm concerned here that we, meaning us editors on Wikipedia, appear to be giving advice -- "These crayons are OK, folks" or "Deadly dangerous, folks" -- rather than reporting what was found. CPSC didn't discuss what happens to these low (per crayon) levels if the crayons all burn in a house fire or in an incinerator (e.g., in an apartment building or a city dump). That, presumably, is another federal agency, the EPA, I imagine, but we need to find out. Timothy Perper (talk) 01:12, 19 December 2009 (UTC)

(From TP): I just googled "EPA crayons asbestos" and got 91,000 hits. In 2005, the whole issue reached the rumor-tracking site Snopes.com <http://www.snopes.com/medical/toxins/crayons.asp>, which concluded that it is FALSE to say that crayons contain toxic amounts of asbestos. Once again, they seem to be referring to danger to children while they draw with crayons, and not to what happens if the crayons are dumped and/or burned. My point is that we (us editors, I mean) should be digging up a range of conclusions and data. To the parents who might read Snopes, the conclusion is reassuring -- a good thing, without doubt -- but it isn't the end of the whole story. In fact, someone called the whole Crayola-asbestos issue a "firestorm." We still need more research. Timothy Perper (talk) 01:25, 19 December 2009 (UTC)

(Also from TP): BTW, you might want to read the article Bindeez, which were toy beads that turned out to be contaminated during manufacture. I contributed a bit to that article, and everyone did a really good job, I think, in digging up information. I'm NOT saying the risks are compatible between Bindeez and Crayolas -- they aren't -- but that the way people worked together on the Bindeez article proved very fruitful. Timothy Perper (talk) 01:35, 19 December 2009 (UTC)

(Also from TP): Here's a website from the state government of Maine (the US state) that seems to be designed to calm fears about asbestos in crayons <http://www.maine.gov/dep/rwm/asbestos/crayons.htm>. But it contains a quote from an EPA spokesperson that they haven't run any tests. Timothy Perper (talk) 01:47, 19 December 2009 (UTC)

This article is incorrect

Saying that Crayola invented the crayon is exactly what's wrong with the internet...perpetuated inaccurate information! Let's set the records straight once and for all.

1. Crayola didn't invent the coloring crayon. Charles A. Bowley of somewhere near Danvers, MA claims to be the first to have made wax crayons for toy and school use; putting them in attractive boxes as early as the late 1880s. (1) 2. The American Crayon Company had a full product line of wax crayons from 1902; a full year before Crayola even developed and began to sell their own wax crayon products. (2) 3. The Prang Educational Company sold watercolor crayons in the 1890s that were clearly predecessors to the paraffin wax crayons being developed (3)

(1) From "The Best of It's Kind" by Brenda J. Elliott, 1996. Subreferenced from "Everyday Art; James C. Judson to Lee P. Spore, re: "Crayon History" by Binney & Smith speaker, C.O. McFadden, 23 Dec 1964, DCTA; Saunders (2) I have a physical copy of the 1902 price list from the American Crayon Company and a copy of one of the pages is referenced in this article: http://www.crayoncollecting.com/Article-Where.htm (all of the pages could be uploaded if I knew how to do that here). In addition, I have several physcial boxes from the price list which could also be photographed and put up here but are referenced in a photo here: http://www.crayoncollecting.com/Other/AMCPhoto001-018.htm (AMC0010 and AMC0009 are from the 1902 crayon catalog. (3) Physical boxes I have in my collection and photograph references located here: http://www.crayoncollecting.com/Other/PEPhoto.htm

Ed Welter (talk) 05:25, 28 January 2010 (UTC)Ed Welter

Sounds like great information to add. Be bold, go ahead and update the article. If you have any questions on how to just ask. PaleAqua (talk) 20:24, 30 January 2010 (UTC)

I have an entire piece ready to add. I even tried adding some of it but I don't understand all the coding format involved with references and so I've pulled out the first part of what I tried to update. I guess I'm looking for some easy way to understand the sytax of adding references; the majority are internet links. Until that time, I can either add the material in without the references or wait. Ed Welter (talk) 23:16, 26 February 2010 (UTC)Ed Welter

Saw your changes, looked good. I tried re-adding the first of your paragraphs using the {{Cite book}}. The extra returns I put inside the template are not necessary just did it to make the fields more visible. References as you can probably see are added by using <ref name="someuniqueid">details</ref> where someuniqueid is a unique label that allows the reference to be reused elsewhere in the article in the format <ref name="someuniqueid"/>. Normally the details are in the form of one of the cite templates, like the cite book, {{cite web}} or the more general {{cite}}. If you are going to be citing books try to include the isbn number if possible. PaleAqua (talk) 05:47, 27 February 2010 (UTC)

See also Help:Footnotes. PaleAqua (talk) 05:48, 27 February 2010 (UTC)

Tell you what...I'll get the words in first (this week) and then work on the references. Ed Welter (talk) 19:56, 28 February 2010 (UTC)Ed Welter

Awesome. I can also help with formatting the references if you wish to just put rough details between <ref> and </ref> tags. PaleAqua (talk) 23:06, 28 February 2010 (UTC)

Thanks for the help on the references. I'm getting them in there. I'd like to add pictures next when I'm done with all the references. Any tips on doing that? Ed Welter (talk) 02:38, 2 March 2010 (UTC)Ed Welter

See Help:Files for information on how to upload pictures. Linked from there is Wikipedia:Picture tutorial which has many examples of the markup for putting images on a page. See also Wikipedia:Images. Depending on the copyright status of the picture you are using you might need to include a fair use tag Wikipedia:Non-free content. If the image is public domain or you can release it into public domain it's probably better to upload them to Wikimedia Commons. Help:Files goes into much more details about all of this and the image upload form has fields that helps filling in the details if I recall. As a bit of a heads up, don't be surprised or offended if someone puts any of the images you upload for review, there are many editors that wish to ensure that as any images use are free to use and will tag unfree images for deletion. Oh and one other thing when you sign talk page messages with ~~~~ you don't need to put your name after the tildas as it is automatically added in. It's why your name is appearing twice in the comments above. PaleAqua (talk) 03:06, 2 March 2010 (UTC)

Wow, Ed, you're doing a great job so far. Keep it up! Definitely do add whatever references you can. I wonder whether the company-by-company approach is the best organization of a description of crayon history? Is it clearer than a chronological ordering would be? Cheers. jacobolus (t) 10:07, 12 March 2010 (UTC)

I considered the company/chonological idea. Actually, the company organization is by chronological order with known earliest wax crayon production dates driving that. I felt that if I merely portrayed the history by date I'd be jumping all over the place between unrelated companies and what they had done or were doing. I chose to place each company in the order that they were first known to have introduced wax crayons and then simply carried their stories forward by company. I want to expand this article with a running list of known crayon colors next (after I figure out how to add pictures). There is another Crayola crayon color list article on Wikipedia but that is only a subset of this information out there. As color is as important to the history of the crayon, I feel it's a useful reference to people that want research on known colors used in the industry. People have long been fascinated with the choice of color names.Ed Welter (talk) 18:31, 15 March 2010 (UTC)

And Yet More Inaccuracies

Focusing on Crayola for this article shows the lack of research and knowledge on the subject of crayons. As I pointed out, if you want to tackle the history of the crayon, you have to at least go back to Charles A. Bowley in the late 1880s as the originator of the wax crayon. Louis Prang's company "Prang Educational Co." would come after that sometime around 1892 with their introduction of their Prang Watercoloring crayons which look and color similar to that of the parafin wax products. Bowley's process was taken to the American Crayon Company and made into a line of wax crayons in 1902. Copies of that catalog still exist with illustrations of the crayons and boxes. A number of physical boxes are also known to exist in private collections including that of Ed Welter. Crayola (then Binney & Smith Co.), not Inc. as this article shows...that didn't change until 1955, introduced a line of Crayola crayons. An important correction here is that Crayola didn't start with just the 8-count box as Crayola claims. A pamphlet called "The Art of Crayola Painting" from 1904 shows 13 of the original line of crayon boxes offered by Crayola. In addition, http://www.crayoncollecting.com/PL-1903.htm provides the complete product line documented from physical box evidence and referenced back to the pamphlet and historical records stored in the National Archive's Binney & Smith collection including a cost sheet identifying all boxes from 1906. Furthermore, Youth's Companion Magazing dated Oct 18, 1906 shows a Ruben's No 500 box of crayons offered as an incentive for magazine sales; clearly disputing Crayola's web site claiming that the Ruben's line was introduced in the 1920s. I have the physical box in mint condition with all the crayons. After Crayola, there are a host of early 1900 companies producing coloring crayons. Companies such as Standard crayon started producing crayons as early as 1905. B&B Crayon Company also produced many crayon products. The New England Crayon Company produced coloring crayons starting around 1905 as well. In all, I have documented around 250 different crayon companies or manufacturers of crayons leading up to the current day. This doesn't even take into account all of the generic crayon manufacturers. These companies can be identified here: http://www.crayoncollecting.com/Other/ByCompany.htm

Ed Welter (talk) 05:59, 28 January 2010 (UTC)Ed Welter

Sounds like work needs to be done. Flynneffects (talk) 18:10, 16 February 2010 (UTC)

Actually, crayons were invented more than 8000 years ago. 71.198.42.112 (talk) 00:06, 26 February 2010 (UTC)