vintage and contemporary postcards and stamps from around the world


27 November 2016

Sunday Stamps II - 102

1998, US,  Celebrate the Century series
illustrated by Richard Waldrep

Binney & Smith developed its wax crayons in 1903 which were branded as Crayola - a name derived from 'craie', French for chalk and 'ola' from oily, or oleaginous, continuing with the popularity at the time of commercial brand names ending with 'ola' (Mazola, Victrola, granola, pianola). Crayola is sold in over 80 countries, though most of the crayons are made in the US. Crayons are sticks of coloured wax, chalk and charcoal. This stamp features the Gold Medal box - the award was won in for their dustless chalk at the 1904 World's Fair. The first box of No 8 crayons had eight colours. You can find a comprehensive list of all the colours ever produced by Crayola here.

for 20th century inventions


7 comments:

Bob Scotney said...

I searched my 'Celebrate the Century' stamps but overlooked these. I still have some crayons that look like these - although they are not the same.

Joy said...

Childhood wouldn't have been complete without these. The list of colours is mind-boggling.

Mail Adventures said...

I love this stamp. In my country, another brand (Plastidecor) was better known when Iwasa child. Now we have also Crayola. The list is quite impressive.

FinnBadger said...

Great stamp - I have that whole set, and I didn't even think to look at them for inspiration this week.

Heleen said...

Love this stamp, as I love drawing and drawing materials (even though I hardly use oil crayons).
I didn't know Crayola existes for over a century. Similar to Eva, in the Netherlands an other brand was better known (Wasco, in my case, and later the Talens crayons) and to me Crayola was a newbie here :-)

Heleen said...

Love this stamp, as I love drawing and drawing materials (even though I hardly use oil crayons).
I didn't know Crayola existes for over a century. Similar to Eva, in the Netherlands an other brand was better known (Wasco, in my case, and later the Talens crayons) and to me Crayola was a newbie here :-)

Maria said...

Wow! A lot of trivia from a single stamp for me :D I have always wondered about that "gold medal" wordings for the crayola boxes on the shelves I've seen as a child.