Product Description

Henry Petroski traces the origins of the pencil back to ancient Greece and Rome, writes factually and charmingly about its development over the centuries and around the world, and shows what the pencil can teach us about engineering and technology today.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #127341 in Books
• Published on: 1992-11-10
• Released on: 1992-11-10
• Original language: English
• Dimensions: 9.21" h x .89" w x 5.22" l, 1.19 pounds
• Binding: Paperback
• 448 pages

From Amazon.com
Like most other human artifacts, the common pencil, made and sold today by the millions, has a long and complex history. Henry Petroski, who combines a talent for fine writing with a deep knowledge of engineering and technological history, examines the story of the pencil, considering it not only as a thing in itself, but also as an exemplar of all things that are designed and manufactured.

Petroski ranges widely in time, discussing the writing technologies of antiquity. But his story really begins in the early modern period, when, in 1565, a Swiss naturalist first described the properties of the mineral that became known as graphite. Petroski traces the evolution of the pencil through the Industrial Revolution, when machine manufacture replaced earlier handwork. Along the way, he looks at some of pencil making's great innovators--including Henry David Thoreau, the famed writer, who worked in his father's pencil factory, inventing techniques for grinding graphite and experimenting with blends of lead, clay, and other ingredients to yield pencils of varying hardness and darkness. Petroski closes with a look at how pencils are made today--a still-imperfect technology that may yet evolve with new advances in materials and design. --Gregory McNamee

From Publishers Weekly
This delightful history of the lowly pencil offers a mind-sharpening look at the intersection of engineering, economics and culture. Illustrated.
Copyright 1992 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From Library Journal
The invention of the pencil was a landmark in the history of ideas. Weaving cultural history into a tale of various engineering and industrial practices, Petroski here traces its development and use in a lively, almost "biographical" manner that is aimed at the general reader. The pencil first appears in antiquity, and its subsequent forms are treated historically. Several chapters explore specific design aspects; the final chapters consider the sociological and philosophical significance of the pencil as a working tool. This well-crafted survey is an appropriate purchase for academic and public libraries, since its contents are a straightforward contribution to the story of technology.
-Paula A. Baxter, NYPL
Copyright 1990 Reed Business Information, Inc.