History of the Pencil Sharpener

For as long as we have had pencils, we have had the need to sharpen the tips in order to keep using them. In the early days of the pencil, or in many art studios across the world today, the easiest and most simplistic way to sharpen a pencil is with a sharp blade: a knife, pair of scissors, or more commonly today: an xacto knife. However, while this may be a simple solution, it is not a perfect solution: the grain of the wood can get caught, the tip can be off center, or worse you take a chunk of your thumb off along with the shavings.

For these varieties of reasons, a device that could uniformly sharpen a pencil was required. Unfortunately, there are many people who can claim to have patented the first pencil sharpener. The first was in 1828 by French mathematician Bernard Lassimone, although not much is currently known about this pencil sharpener. Following this, Therry des Estwaux invented the first manual pencil sharpener. Soon after, the patent offices around the world were filled with improved pencil sharpeners, such as John Lee Love's "Love Sharpener," an improved pencil sharpener, from 1895 that had the user twist the pencil around the exterior ring which would sharpen the pencil. Love's invention eventually lead to the creation of mechanical sharpeners.

Today pencil sharpeners still come in a variety of ways: sharpeners that you turn the pencil; sharpeners where you operate a hand crank; and a multitude of automatic electric pencil sharpeners. Some are portable, others mounted, some are battery powered and others must be plugged. Nevertheless, whatever your preference, there is a way to sharpen your pencil.