CRAYOLA

'Crayola' is a brand of crayons and other writing and drawing utensils, such as markers, chalk, and colored pencils manufactured by Binney & Smith, Inc. The Crayola company was one of the first to make its crayons, chalk, markers, and colored pencils as well as other writing utensils and artistry tools non-toxic.
It is primarily popular in the United States, Canada, New Zealand, Australia,Guatemala and the United Kingdom.

Contents

History

Timeline

Crayola colors

Trivia

Popular culture

References

External links

History

Crayola Crayons were invented by cousins Edwin Binney and C. Harold Smith. Binney's wife Alice coined the word "Crayola" by combining the French word for chalk (''craie'') and the "olea" part of "oleaginous" (oily).
The first box of Binney & Smith crayons, produced in 1903, sold for a nickel and contained eight colors: red, orange, yellow, green, blue, violet, brown, and black. While it was widely known that the 8 count box was the box they initially sold their crayons in, they carried a full line of boxes in different sizes and colors for many uses. Each box used a numbering system to identify them. In reality they had around 20 different crayon box offerings. They ranged from the Rubens Crayola No 6 which was targeted for artists to the No 51, which contained 28 colors. Many of these colors are no longer documented with Crayola. Colors such as English Vermillion, Venetian Red, Permanent Magenta and Van Dyke Brown. In truth, Crayola's earliest years had around 38 different colors across their product line. They expanded this in 1926 with the acquisition of the Munsell color line. In the 1930s they put out a rare compilation of 52 colors into a box. By this time they had done a lot of renaming and color adjustments.
In 1949, they did more color reorganization by introducing the box of 48 colors still sold today. Unfortunately, Crayola only recognizes a couple of very specific color name changes in their history. These include the change in 1958 when the name Prussian Blue was changed to Midnight Blue in response to requests from teachers. In the same year additional crayons were added, expanding the selection to 64 colors. New colors included Copper, Plum, Lavender, Mulberry, Burnt Orange, Aquamarine and ten other colors.
In 1962, Binney & Smith chose to change the name Flesh to Peach in response to the Civil Rights Movement, since not all people are the same skin color. While this is accurate, in reality, Crayola had changed this color from its original 1903 'Flesh Tint' to Flesh then temporarily to 'Pink Beige', back to Flesh and then finally to Peach. In 1999, the name Indian Red was changed to Chestnut because children wrongly perceived the color to be that of Native Americans, when in fact "Indian Red" had its roots in a dye from India. There have been numerous other name changes undocumented but just as real. Van Dyke Brown changed to plain Brown. Madder Lake changed to Dark Red. Rose Pink eventually became Carnation Pink. Charcoal Gray became Neutral Gray and then finally just Gray. There are many other examples of this throughout their history.
In 1972 eight bright, neon crayons were added: Chartreuse, Ultra Blue, Ultra Orange, Ultra Red, Hot Magenta, Ultra Green, Ultra Pink, and Ultra Yellow.
In 1990 only the name Hot Magenta stayed and the other names were replaced by: Atomic Tangerine, Outrageous Orange, Shocking Pink, Blizzard Blue, Laser Lemon, Screamin' Green, and Wild Watermelon. Eight additional fluorescents were added: Electric Lime, Purple Pizzazz, Razzle Dazzle Rose, Unmellow Yellow, Magic Mint, Radical Red, Sunglow, and Neon Carrot.
In 1990 Crayola did some promotional work to formally retire eight colors and replace them with eight new shades. While these might be the first official retired colors, there have been many other colors not recognized as so over the years. Nevertheless, the retired colors enshrined in the Crayola Hall of Fame included: Green Blue, Orange Red, Orange Yellow, Violet Blue, Maize, Lemon Yellow, Blue Gray and Raw Umber. Colors added were Cerulean, Vivid Tangerine, Jungle Green, Fuchsia, Dandelion, Teal Blue, Royal Purple, and Wild Strawberry.
Consumers named 16 new colors in 1993, bringing the total to 96. New colors included Asparagus, Macaroni and Cheese, Razzmatazz, Timber Wolf, Cerise, Mauvelous, Robin's Egg Blue, Tropical Rain Forest, Denim, Pacific Blue, Shamrock, Tumbleweed, Granny Smith Apple, Purple Mountain's Majesty, Tickle Me Pink, and Wisteria.
Magic Scents Crayons was a line of Crayola crayons that were scented. Binney & Smith Inc. introduced them in 1994 with mostly food scents. There were numerous reports that children were eating the food-scented crayons, so the food scents were retired and replaced with non-food scents, which later evolved into Color 'N Smell in 1997. Crayola stopped producing scented crayons until a new line called Silly Scents in 2007.
In 1998, 24 new colors were added, bringing the total to 120. The names continued to evolve, with colors like Pink Flamingo, Caribbean Green, Fuzzy Wuzzy Brown, Purple Heart, Banana Mania, Cotton Candy, Manatee, Outer Space, Shadow, Pig Pink, Vivid Violet, and Mountain Meadow. Thistle was retired from the 120-count assortment in 2000 to make room for Indigo, and Torch Red was renamed Scarlet.
Crayola marked their 100th birthday by having consumers again name new colors and vote four out: Blizzard Blue, Magic Mint, Mulberry, and Teal Blue made way for Inch Worm, Jazzberry Jam, Mango Tango, and Wild Blue Yonder.

Timeline

Crayola colors

Crayola crayon packs have come in a variety of sizes from 2 crayons up to 800 for the bulk boxes. The colors contained in a package have ranged from 2 up to 200 (although a 200 color package includes "special effect" crayons such as glitters or neons, etc.). In general, though, the most common packages are multiples of eight: 8, 16, 24, 32, (40), 48, (56), 64, 72, 80, (88), 96, (104), (112), and 120 packs. The 120 pack is sometimes a package composed of two 48 pack containers and a 24 pack container. There have been 240 pack Crayola Cases that simply house two of the 120 crayon cases, although limited a number of these have been produced since 2005.
Here are the colors in the 8, 16, and 24 packs as of 2005 (color values are approximate):

8 pack	+8 = 16 pack	+8 = 24 pack
Red	Carnation Pink	Violet Red
Orange	Red Orange	Scarlet
Yellow	Yellow Orange	Dandelion
Green	Yellow Green	Green Yellow
Blue	Blue Green	Cerulean
Violet (purple)	Blue Violet	Indigo
Brown	Red Violet	Apricot
Black	White	Gray

Trivia

★ When Crayola asked celebrities about their favorite Crayola Colors, Britney Spears chose robin's egg blue, Tiger Woods chose wild strawberry, Mario Andretti chose pig pink, George W. Bush chose blue bell, and Fred Rogers of Mr. Rogers' Neighborhood chose lemon yellow.^[1]

★ Each year, Binney & Smith produces 3 billion crayons.

★ The average child in the USA will wear down 730 crayons by his or her 10th birthday.

★ On the back of many crayola colored pencil boxes they show a list of the colors in the box. For some strange reason the color black has always been drawn as a dark green color.

Popular culture

Crayola Monologues is an animated video about label changes

★ The band Lemon Demon produced a song, "Ode to Crayola," which praises the company and the variety of crayon colors.

★ Kristen Andreassen, an independent country music artist, wrote and recorded a song entitled, "Crayola Doesn't Make a Color for Your Eyes" in which the narrator goes through several shades of blue, green, and brown trying to draw the subject of the song. It contains the line, "That crayon's telling lies," a reference to Crayola's claim to make colors for everything.

★ Crayola Monologues is an animated video that uses Crayola crayons as a human metaphor for exploring color and identity in the United States. This animated video features crayons expressing how color hierarchies have shaped their lives.

★ X-Entertainment has a satirical article in which Spider-Man reviews every color in a box of 96 Crayola-crayons.

References

1. www.crayola.com/canwehelp/pressroom/colorcensustrivia.pdf PDF

Scottish band Camera Obscura have a song named "Razle Dazzle Rose" presumably after the Crayola crayon of the same name.

External links

★ The Crayola Official Website

★ A crayon collectors site with extensive info on Crayola crayons and boxes

★ Tiona Marco has made a small but growing splash in the visual art scene by her artwork; she uses crayola crayons to create fine art drawings on construction paper.

★ '' Orange: A Crayola raw materials data sheet from the 1970's'' Smithsonian Institution Libraries

★ Binney & Smith Timeline

★ Color Chronology from Crayola.com

★ Color Chronology from FactMonster.com

★ Crayola Crayon History - About.com

★ Antique Crayola color lists - Antique Crayola colors found in old Crayola boxes. Many are not on Crayola's own Chronology.

★ 2004 State-Your-Color contest - gave equivalent state, Washington DC and patriotic color names for a limited edition 64 crayon box. They are added as equivalents to the Crayola alphabetic color list in the wiki main article above. This list is also on the Crayola site, but the linked web page is more compact and has a reviewer comment.

★ Color Icon: Crayola Crayons