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Transcript
If you just did it continuously without stopping, that's almost 16 days I start putting pencils.
Oh, my God. Hello, and welcome to the Erasable Podcast. This is episode 199, just before the milestone 200th episode. But we're not waiting to interview a man who's been in the news a lot lately, and his name is already familiar to members of the American Pencil Collector Society. Joining us tonight is Aaron Bothelmy, secretary, treasurer of the APCS and future world record holder. Thanks for joining us, Aaron.
Thanks, guys. Glad to be here.
Yeah.
And also with us, of course, are Andy and Tim. And I'm Johnny.
Hello.
Forgot that part.
Hey, Aaron. I have to talk about that part. Aaron, I'm just excited to talk to you. I feel like we've communicated on email for, you know, some years now, so it's cool to just kind of hear your voice.
Yeah, it's cool to finally connect.
Yeah.
Yeah. And I was double checking the spelling of your name on Google and there are all these news stories that talk about you that were put out in the last two weeks.
Yeah, it's been crazy how the news has just taken off. I did not expect that to happen.
That's awesome.
It's amazing.
Well, we have. We have the exclusive. The exclusive interview. We're basically the Barbara Walters of the pencil world. So I guess there's been a couple
others that beat you out, but you are the one and only podcast, so yay.
And the number two.
Awesome. You want to jump in so we can take as long as we want?
Yeah.
Awesome. I'll go first and ask the question that we always have to ask people. So a lot of us have sent snail mail directly to you with our Pencil Collector Society dues, but we have no idea what sort of pencil user or pencil collector you are. Like, what got you interested in pencils? What's your pencil origin story?
Yeah. So I always mark my start in collecting at first grade. Our teacher gave all the students in her class a few of those, like, shiny, colorful pentech pencils for Christmas one year. And my family's just always kind of had the collecting bug. So something in me just thought those were neat and decided to keep them instead of sharpening them like all of my classmates. And so that was kind of what got me started. And then I grew up antiquing with my grandpa. We would go to antique stores and flea markets during the summer. And so that's really how I got into the. The antique advertising pencils was just going to all those flea markets and looking at all the cool stuff while grandpa was off over, you know, looking at other stuff.
Did you still have those Pentech pencils?
I do. I was not smart enough to, you know, identify which ones specifically were the first, but I could at least get close to figuring that out.
Oh, that's awesome.
Yeah.
I'm curious. I used to, when I was younger, I used to go travel to Florida, stay with my grandparents. There were a lot of like really amazing flea markets down there that we would go to. And my thing was always looking for, I was looking for records or I was looking for golf stuff or whatever. But like, I'm just wondering about like that experience when you were a kid of like going and starting the collection at that time, like, were you buying them kind of in like large amounts or was just kind of like, oh, I like this one, Ooh, I like this one. Or what kind of like drove you at that point to like pick things up? Was it just, I don't have that one, let me have it. Or what was that like?
Essentially? Yeah. I mean, I think it really helped. It was something small and cheap that, you know, even in elementary school I could afford. But it was, yeah, I think a lot of times it was buying smaller. A couple here, a couple there. You know, I remember once or twice buying like a cigar box full and I was just over the moon. But yeah, it did definitely. It started small and just kind of grew gradually.
Are you a pencil user as well as a collector?
Yes. Certainly not. Maybe not to the extent that you guys and your listeners are. Mine is more like, here's a cool old one that was sharpened when I got it, so I'll use it instead of collect it. But I just, I like the older vintage ones. It's, you know, they're better quality and it's, it's just kind of fun. When I was a teacher, those, those cast offs would be the ones that went to school with me and I could always get them back because I was the only one, you know, giving out like 30 year old seed company pencils.
Yeah. So gosh, I'm trying to like think back of when I first kind of joined the American Pencil Collector society member number 2099 here. I like last one in before the, you know, the 2100 Club. But I guess I can't really remember a time when you weren't involved with that organization. How did you first get involved and kind of get on the board?
Yeah, so I first joined in high school, it was in 2004. And I'm pretty sure I First learned about the club through a vendor at one of those flea markets. It was somebody that I bought a box of pencils from. And you know, in those days as a kid, all of the vendors liked kind of educating the younger generation. And so he knew that I was interested in pencils and he had been a member of the club and kind of got me onto that. And so I think I joined as a birthday present from my parents in 2004 and then ended up at my first convention a few years later. I think that was 09 that I went to my first convention and have not missed one since then. Really enjoyed getting involved and so the secretary treasurer position to open up in 2015 and so I took that over at that point.
What's Your member number?
1980.
Oh, nice.
That's a good one.
Yeah, that is a very good one.
Do you, could you say something like I just started interrupt, Johnny, but I was just.
Oh, you're fine.
We haven't talked too much about the or we haven't had. We haven't talked to anybody who's been at the conventions. Can you talk a little bit about what these conventions are like? Like when you started going and you said, was that 2009 when you first went?
Yeah.
What are they like and how have they sort of expanded and developed over time?
Yeah, so I think unfortunately in some ways they're, they're shrinking a little bit over time. I know they used to be, you know, really this multi day event with all of the different people, you know, and certainly the crowd that comes has gotten smaller, but they are still just, they're amazing events. It's, you know, it's a chance to reconnect with all the friends that you only get to see every couple of years. And it is just a room full of pencils that you get to spend like two straight days just digging through and swapping and finding all the cool ones that the other people bring and you know, just swapping stories of all the cool stuff that you've found in the last year and the cool stuff they've found in the last year. And it's just, it's really cool to be with a room full of these like minded people who geek out about the same stuff that you do.
That is really cool.
So do these take place over more than one day?
Yeah, typically they're two day events.
So on the second day, does the room smell like cedar?
Probably
can't tell anymore. It just smells it all the time anyways.
Yeah, it's like something smells right in
Here it was really. Well, I know we'll get to the event later, but it was really kind of funny. When I had my counting event and had all of my pencils in one room. I had multiple people come in and tell me, you know, it smells like pencils in here. And I'm like, what? It was great.
Like you say that like it's bad. Yeah. So you mentioned that you are still a pen or a pencil user, not just collector. So before we talk about your world record, what are some of your favorite pencils to use?
Yeah, so I, I don't, I don't get a lot into the, the brand names and the manufacturers. You know my desk at work, all the pencils are like, you know, 30 year old pencil from a hardware store and one from a bank and one from a community college. Like it's just the fun. It's the same kind of stuff that I collect that, that weird advertising and I just really enjoy getting to use those.
Yeah, I'd actually love, before we get talking about, you know, the world record stuff and the counting, I'd love to just kind of like talk about the shape of your collection a little bit. Like how is there like a particular scope of pencils that you're collecting or is it just any pencil? And like there's some advertising pencils, some old brand name pencils. Like how do you, how do you like kind of see the large shape of your collection?
Yeah, so the, the vast majority of what I collect is antique advertising woods. I, I limit myself to wooden pencils. I don't get into the bullets or the mechanicals or anything. But from there I really have a little of everything. I've got brand names, I've got novelties, I've got carpenters. You know, I, I really don't pigeonhole myself, which is how it's gotten so large and out of hand. But yeah, the vast majority is advertising pencils.
Makes sense. Yeah. Especially in the Midwest. When I was in Indiana, they were just like all over the flea markets and just lots of, especially a lot of agriculture advertising pencils.
Yes, Agriculture, insurance.
Yeah, yeah.
Certain ones there's just tons of.
I have a bunch from a burlap bag company in Texas.
Oh, interesting.
And they're really nice. They're a little fatter, they're red cedar. They have a really long ferrule.
Sweet.
That's really cool. Any, any really super rare pencils that you're especially proud of that you have as part of this collection?
I think I'm most proud of some of My historic ones. I love the ones from World War II, where you got just that intense patriotism and back in the war effort. It's just a fun little slice of life of seeing all the different things that they put on the pencils, you know, from the kind of commonplace. Remember Pearl harbor to some of the kind of outlandish slogans that they put on there about, you know, go get em sort of thing.
Yeah, don't use the rubber on this eraser to save rubber for our boys overseas.
Exactly. Yep, yep.
Yeah, that's. I was gonna ask, like, with. I'm just thinking about the convention. We've all been to pen conventions, like fountain pen conventions, and there's kind of like these. There's much more of a hierarchy, you know, with. With that world. And it seems like this one's more kind of, like, inclusive. It's just kind of like seeing, like, oh, I don't have that. I haven't said that, but. Or like, at the convention. Or they're, like, super. I don't know, like, grail pencils or categories that people are like, oh, gosh, I'd love to find one of those, and they're hunting for them. Or is it more just about the camaraderie and just the swapping of what you haven't seen yet?
It really seems like everybody just kind of has their own little niche. So they've all got that one particular type that they're looking for. So, you know, we've got guys where they're only collecting bullet pencils, so they'll hone in on that and find the specific type or style that they're looking for. There's one guy from Florida that worked for a telephone company, and so he looks for all the pencils that have, like, an image of a telephone on them. The ones that I really go for anything with a date on them. So there's ones with, like, the old school, like, sports schedules and things like that. So everybody's just kind of digging through the same boxes and picking out all the ones that mean something to them.
Those.
Oh, that's.
Those bullet pencil guys are intense.
They are, yes.
I love the. The people in the, like, classifieds of the APCS newsletter just, like, looking for any and all bullet pencils, especially some from, like, these states doing these things. It's just, like, amazing.
Like, yeah, super interesting that it's something that you collect that unlike. Just to compare it again, like, with whole fountain pen world, like, there's, like, a record of every. Pretty much everything that's out There. Right. Like, I mean, I imagine that with the advertising pencil, it's just like, you never know what you're gonna find. Like, you don't even know what you're missing because you're just. You're just hunting. As opposed to the world of like. Well, I've got one of these from, you know, a model from 1922 all the way up to 1948, but I need a 43 or whatever. I don't know. Yeah, but it's just like a total. A vast world.
You're right. That. That really is part of the fun of it is you just. You have no idea what's out there. And so there's always that surprise of digging through the box and just, you know, seeing what you can find and seeing what new and weird stuff you come across.
How do you. How do you organize all of these pencils? Like, kind of when you realized you were starting to get, like, pretty serious and you're like, oh, wow, I have, like, quite a few of these pencils. How do you kind of keep them categorized and separate and organized?
Yeah, good question. It took me a while to get that to that point. A few years back, probably about 10 years ago now, I finally started myself a database. So every new pencil I get, I enter that into a spreadsheet. So I've got, you know, what's on the pencil, what color it is, where I got it, when I got it. And so that just helps me kind of keep track of things. And then at the same time, I really started kind of a sorting system of how I was going to organize the physical collection. So most of it I've sorted by city and state based on what the advertising is. So where that company was located, you know, some other categories beyond that, but most of it is, you know, based on what. What it's advertising or where it's advertising.
Yeah. That's amazing. Do you. Do you keep them? I don't mean to, like, go down a rabbit hole and get super nerdy, but are you keeping them in, like, jars or boxes or cases? Like, how do you physically kind of contain them?
Yeah, it's. It's a little of everything. I started out, most of it was in cigar boxes. I just had piles and piles of cigar boxes, and I've kind of. Kind of honed it a little bit from there. Certainly some of it is still in that. I have a lot of these cool kind of plastic tubes where they can stand on end. They're actually designed as Beanie Baby display cases, but they are the Perfect size for pencils, and it's a neat way to display them visually. And then in my garage, I have one wall that is these metal clothes card catalog cabinets. There was a company here in town in Colfax that manufactured folding tables, and these held all of their customer records on index cards. Huh. And I managed to acquire those a few years back, and they're the perfect size for putting two pencils end to end. So I've got a lot of my collection stored like that.
Wow.
Oh, that.
That's a. That's a really cool idea. I'm looking up these little Beanie Baby cylinders right now. Right now. That's such a great idea. They're just like, you can buy them individually for like $6. So I imagine if you're buying more than a dozen of them, they're much cheaper.
Yeah. And the nice thing is I didn't have to buy most of them. As I mentioned, my family kind of had the collecting bug. So one of the things my grandpa collected was Beanie Babies. So when we finally decided we didn't need that collection anymore, I got all the cases.
Yeah. I tell you, those, those Princess Diana Beanie Babies are going to go back up in value at some point. Just. Just waiting for that.
I still think about when my dog got a hold of our Jerry Garcia themed Beanie Baby. That was the one that we thought was going to be worth like a million dollars or whatever in the. In the. In the thick of things. Plus, we were all Deadheads, so that helped too. We were just like, probably wouldn't have sold it anyways.
Yeah.
I'm wondering, just like you've mentioned, I think you mentioned estate sales earlier and you've talked about the conventions. Do you have any sort of stories about some of the strangest or most unexpected ways that you've come across pencils that have made it into your collection?
I guess I don't know about weirdest ways they've come in. Just one story that comes to mind of a cool find. I know I shared this in our newsletter for anybody that's a member, but as the person that does the welcome packets for anybody joining the club, I always send out this info sheet with some history of the background of the club. And so there's a story in there of where the founders first kind of discovered pencil collecting. They were at a cafe at a gas station down in southern Iowa, and this guy had pencils just, like lining the walls. Like, he had his collection displayed like that. And the family went in there and saw that, and we're kind of like, hey, pencils, those are cool. And so I was on this quest to find, like, a pencil from this guy's station. You know, surely if he did this and was running a business, he must have had advertising. And so I, you know, at that point, I had thousands of pencils, tons from Iowa, hadn't seen anything from there, and then went to an estate sale just a couple years ago, and this family happened to be from that tiny town in Southern Iowa, and there were, like, five pencils in a box under a table, and one of them was from his service station.
Amazing.
Yeah.
Yeah. That's really cool.
That's awesome.
I. I've always wanted to, like, yeah, just, like, go to an estate sale and just, like, find that kind of, like, hidden cache of, like, you know, like, old black wings from the 40s or, you know, microtomics or, you know, things like that have not, like. And the trouble is, so often it just seems like, you know, those are the kind of things somebody empties out the drawer of somebody who died, and they just, like, throw that kind of stuff away. They don't even make it to the estate sale.
Yes, absolutely. I can't tell you how often I hear that story of, oh, when we cleaned out my grandpa's house, we just threw all that away. It's like, oh, no.
Do you. Do you have, like, a network of, like, estate sale agents that you're like, now, don't. Don't throw that away. Like. Like, call me.
I don't know about estate sales, but I certainly had several of my. My flea market dealers. There were certain shows that I would make sure to go to every year, and there were certain dealers that would start, like, you know, putting pencils under the table for me and setting them aside. So, yeah, that was pretty cool.
That's really great. Awesome.
So I'll take the next one.
Yeah.
Moving on to your world record Ness.
Yes.
We don't get to talk with world record holders very often. So what sort of, you know, got you started on the path for vying for the record? Did you, like, count your pencils one day and you're like, whoa, I have more than that guy has?
Yeah. So at some point. So the database that I have has been real helpful for knowing just how much I have, because it's a spreadsheet, so it just counts as you go. So I've been able to really track things that way, and a few years back, stumbled onto the world record site. I don't know if it was one of My students, or if I was just Googling one day, but just discovered that the record was like, I think maybe 20,000 at that point. And it's like, well, geez, I have way more than that. That doesn't seem right. And so I looked into it, and I thought it was going to be real easy. You know, I've got this database that lists everything I have and where it's from. And I thought I could just send this database off to Guinness and they would check it off and say, yep, good job. And then I learned that it was not going to be anywhere close to that easy. So I just kind of put that dream aside for a few years and let it go.
It just seems like if you're, you know, going to all the trouble of, like, faking a database like that, like, you should get some A for effort there, because that's a big database to fake.
Right? Like, who's gonna just do that and make it all up? But so, yeah, so I put it aside, thought, you know, there's no way. I mean, their. Their evidence requirements are intense. And it's like, there is no way that I can make this happen. But then last year at one of our. At our convention last summer, got to talking about, you know, having looked into that and having applied for it and how I thought that it was unachievable. And the members that I was chatting with were all like, no, you should totally do that. You should go for that. We'll help with that. We'll get you there. And so, yeah, I just. That was kind of the springboard to actually move forward and commit to it and make the decision to try and do it.
That's so cool.
Yeah. So can you tell us about the process of applying for recognition as a world record holder? Like, what was the accounting process like, which I know you did kind of in a public fashion with, I think with the convention and. Yeah, like, what's. And what. What do you get from it? You know?
Or like, right.
Not. Not meaning, like, what, do they send you a plaque? Or like, what's this? What's the whole process like?
Yeah, so they just have these list of guidelines of everything that you must do in order to meet their requirements. And so, yep, I had to host a public event where the count would take place. I had to have exactly two counters each count, the entire collection. We had to film the entire count. And then I had to send in all of those video clips, my database, statements from the witnesses, just a wide variety of things.
I figured there would just be like some old, you know, Irish man with a big mustache and a top hat who would come and just like watch the whole thing or something.
I was really hoping, I mean, that that would be pretty cool. I was really hoping to get Guinness out because that is an option. You can get somebody from Guinness to like come out and witness it and then you don't have to film everything and send in as much evidence. But I found out that that was going to be like thousands of dollars to make them do that.
You have to pay for their travel.
Yes, something. I pay for a new car for them. I'm not sure. It was crazy.
Do you know how many, you know how many teenagers I've been a teacher? You know how many middle schoolers have bought their books? Like, oh, yeah, they've got the money to travel.
I'm sure they were just like, you have to put us up in the, you know, the Ritz Carlton. And this is our writer. Like, only green M and Ms. Wow.
Yeah, it was. It was quite the day. So we started. We started at 8am on Saturday. And I had no idea when we were setting all this up, you know, trying to arrange all the people in the event space and everything. It's like, I have no idea how long it is going to take to count this many pencils. So we were just kind of doing some rough math and some guessing. And by 9:00 o'clock that night, we still had not gotten through the whole collection. So we actually got them to agree. I tried to talk them out of it. I said, no, we had enough to break the record. Just go home, it's fine. And they were committed to finishing it out. So they actually came back the next morning and did five more hours of counting.
Wow.
Incredible.
How many people were there?
So I'd say we had about a hundred people, mostly from the community come out and see. And it was just really cool, you know, A lot of it was friends and family members who knew about me, knew about my collection, just wanted to come out and see and support. But I had a lot of random strangers too, that were just interested in the collection, interested in. In the uniqueness of it, that wanted to come out and see. I had one random guy, like, take a selfie with me. I had another mom ask me to take a picture with her kids. I didn't know who these people were. It was just really weird being celebrity for a day.
Yeah, that's so cool. If I was anywhere just like close to the Midwest, I totally would have come. That sounds like it was just a Real. Just a real fun celebration of pencils.
Yeah. And so now it's just a long waiting process. So I had to upload everything to their website that included 9710 minute video clips which took a painful amount of time to upload.
Yeah.
And so now I'd use Dropbox, took
care of us as FTP boy.
So now I just have to wait. They said it's probably going to be about 12 weeks for them to review everything and then they'll make the determination if I've done enough to break the record. Like numbers wise, it is very clear that I've broken the record, but I have to have dotted all the I's and crossed all the T's that they want to see if I'm actually approved.
Hmm. What do you know about the previous. The, the, I guess I should say the current record holder.
So current record holder is a guy from Uruguay who has about 24,000 pencils.
Yeah.
And my record, the number I'm submitting to Guinness is 69,255. Wow.
Oh my God. You beat him by a little bit.
A little bit, yeah.
Even if there's a few doubles in there, I think you still got.
Yeah,
So, so that's a 10. Now you said 9710 minute videos, so 970 minutes. So they're going to sit and watch 970 minutes of counting. Is that, is that the idea though, that they would like literally view all of that footage to confirm it?
I'm really not sure. I, I cannot imagine that anybody would have the patience to do that. I think that's the idea, but I have no idea if they actually will or if they'll just go, hmm, yep. You, you did this thing.
It's just there in case, you know, somebody contests you. They can be like, no, look, see,
run it through AI or something.
Yeah, yeah.
If you don't believe us, you can watch.
What if it's all deepfaked? What if you all just like made a. Just an AI pencil counting Deepak video again?
So much effort. Still deserves it seems.
Yeah.
That's awesome.
So do you, you know, get just like a lifetime supply of like Guinness if you win this like, I mean, bragging rights. But is there any other sort of like, interesting perks of like holding a Guinness World Record?
From what I can tell, I think the only physical thing you get is a certificate declaring that you are the world record holder. And then it's just, you know, kind of the enduring fame until somebody else snatches that away.
Until somebody comes in with 70,000 pencils.
Right.
Or to follow your lead, 110,000 pencils. It just blows by like a huge jump.
What you have is sort of like a corporate two truths and a lie, like icebreaker fodder for the rest of your life. So. Yeah.
And even without being approved, I've already gotten my 15 minutes of fame in ways that I never expected. As you said, you know, if you Google my name right now, you will see an endless amount of stories.
Yeah.
You know, when I. When I had the event, I invited out, there are three Des Moines TV news stations. And so I invited them out, and I think having them there helped the story spread. And so within a few days, it had been picked up by the Associated Press, and it just kind of spread across the country from there. Since then, I've had two interviews with different Canadian radio stations. I have been interviewed by the Washington Post and by a newspaper from Spain.
That's amazing.
All right.
That's so cool. So I was gonna say I kind of answered that, but besides, you know, just a quirky podcast about pencils, like, what's. What's kind of like the weirdest publication that's reached out. Sounds like newspaper from Spain, kind of randomly.
Yeah, I think that's probably the weirdest one. The Washington Post certainly blew me away. You know, it's one thing when this quirky Canadian radio show reaches out to you, but when the Washington Post reaches out, it's like, oh, wow, okay.
Oh, that's so good. I love that. So I guess, what are your. What are your plans to celebrate? Like, when you. When they sort of, like, officially declare it, you know, Guinness World Record? Are you. Are you going to Disney World? Are you going to sip on some Guinness? Kind of. What are you. What are you thinking?
You know, I don't think I've thought that far out. It. It has kind of been one day at a time at this point of getting the. The event planned and ready and then getting the evidence uploaded and submitted.
Yeah.
So it's just going to kind of be. Sit back and wait. Yeah, I. I don't know that I really have plans for celebrating, but we'll certainly have to figure something out.
You gotta dip into the APCs, like, discretionary budget and, like, have a. Have a nice dinner or something.
Could have, like, an extra convention.
There you go.
This one is catered.
This one is held at your house.
Yeah. I'm just imagining, like, a scene like him. It was at the Dark Knight, the one where he's got all the cash behind him and he's like, it's burning, and he's walking away from it. You're just like, all right, well, set the record. And I'm saying I'm probably. That's probably horrifying to hear when you're a collector. But I was like, I just had that image. I was like, golly, that'd be nuts. Yeah.
Aaron, methodically speaking, how does, like, how did the counting happen? Did you just get out, like, all of your jars and boxes and people, like, do a count and write it down and then add it all? Like, tally it all up at the end or. How did that go?
Yeah, so I had to. So because it was a public event, I had to bring my entire collection to the event space. So our museum in town here has, like, a community center room, and so took five car trips to take my entire collection down the road to the museum. And then. Yeah, we just counted it one box or one drawer at a time. There were 470 boxes to get through. And so counter number one counted the box, we wrote down his number, passed it off to counter number two. He counted the same box, we wrote down his number and just went through all 470 boxes that way, just one time.
Did you take lots of photos that you can. You could feel an entire Instagram account in this for, like, months?
Yeah, we. My sister came out. She was. She asked if I wanted somebody to, you know, kind of photograph and document the event. And I said, yeah, that'd be awesome. And then we quickly realized that there is not really that much to take pictures of. It's like, here they are counting. Here they are counting again. But, yeah, certainly lots of fun pencil shots.
Here's a fun fact. If you made a Twitter account and you tweeted a picture of one of your pencils every hour, it would take more than eight years to get through your entire collection.
Holy cow.
So that sounds like something to do.
That's if you don't sleep, right?
Yeah, exactly. Well, you know, you'd automate it. You take. You know, you'd set it all up.
Takes two years to automate it.
I'm sorry, Twitter. Not Twitter.
X. X. I was going to say, there's not going to be a Twitter in eight years.
That's what we're calling it now. Instagram account. You can do it as an Instagram. Anyhow. Sorry, yes.
So we always ask this sort of toward the end, is there anything we didn't bring up that you wanted to mention or chat about? Like pencil sharpeners, erasers?
Oh, gosh.
Any other fun like pencil goodies? Are you secretly into fountain pens?
I'm not. You know, I stick just to the pencils. I collect all of the other random pencil stuff that goes along with it. I had a whole display of that at the event. So, you know, pencil boxes and the blotters and things like that. So anything that's the ephemera or the advertising that went along with that.
Do you have any non pencil collections?
I do. I collect local advertising from my two hometowns. So kind of in the same vein of that advertising. But yeah, I get real excited about that stuff too.
That's really cool. My mom has kind of like several big collections going. She collects like Pepsi memorabilia and she collects those old kind of like weird mid century personified fruit that you see in refrigerator magnets and wall hangings. And it's hard to kind of explain that, but yeah, just interesting. I definitely come from a family of just like collectors as well.
Well, it seems like that's pretty common in the club too. Like everybody in the club obviously collects pencils and then most of them also collect something else. Like you just can't help it.
Yeah, when I, when I moved to the Bay Area and just like seriously downsized my space, I was like, I really need to like have collections that don't take up much room. So like my press pennies, that's, that's a fun one. That doesn't, doesn't take up that much room, but it's still like, you know, you can get pretty, pretty involved with that.
So I mean, that's what I thought about pencils too. And then it kind of.
Yeah. Until you get to 70,000 of them. Yeah.
Yeah.
I mean, 70,000 of anything.
Yes.
70,000 presidencies,
that would be so heavy.
But at that point I have like at least, you know, $7,000 invested in this.
But you can't take them.
Yeah.
Because I deface that much. Actually, it's more than that because it's, it's 50 cents. It's 51 cents to press a penny. So, man, I don't think I'll ever quite get there, but that's really cool. Any, Any tips, Aaron, for folks who are thinking about sort of like, you know, I bet a lot of listeners here have some kind of a pencil collection. But if somebody wanted to get really serious about it and go really deep and just like start kind of proactively looking for any, any tips you have for them about starting their pencil collection,
I think it really is just, you know, look for things you love Find the things that you're really interested in. The goal should never be just amass a huge collection of stuff that doesn't interest you. Find the things that really speak to you and the stuff that you find really interesting, and you're. You're just going to enjoy every minute of it.
Yeah, that's great.
That makes me just the way that you describe that about something that you love. Maybe when I ask you with. How do I ask this? Are there certain pencils that pop up that you see that you then sort of dig into and research about and find out some of the backstory on?
Absolutely. My wife kind of laughs at me for that in a very loving way. When I'm doing my. When I'm doing my database, I always have a Google tab open and I'm, you know, Googling as much as I can about, you know, certainly not everyone, but some of the weird stuff that shows up on there. I'm. You know, I've got a subscription to Newspapers.com, so I'm looking up old newspaper articles and I'm looking up the story of that business. And yeah, I just. I love digging into the history. I'm. I'm certainly a history nerd.
And that's.
That's what really interests me about the collection. What's kept me going with it.
Pencils are kind of a gateway to history.
Yes, absolutely.
That's really cool.
And podcasting.
That's neat.
Awesome. So should we button up?
Yeah. Yeah.
Or does anyone have anything else they'd like to chat about?
I. I mean, I guess we have a little time. I. I guess I'd be kind of interested in knowing. Aaron, what do you. Besides collecting pencils? What do you. What do you do for fun? What are some of your favorite shows or books or hobbies?
So my biggest hobby is antiquing. During the pandemic, I started a little buying and selling business on the side. Really giving me an excuse to keep going to the estate sales and the flea markets and just find all that stuff that everybody else overlooks.
Mm.
I'm the guy that goes to an estate sale and, like, heads down to the basement and digs through all the boxes that everybody else ignores.
Yeah.
And that's just been a lot of fun. I've always kind of had an eye for that, and I've always loved going to the flea markets. And so it's been really fun to turn that into a little side business.
Have you ever watched Swap Shop on Netflix?
I have not, no.
It's a. It's a fun Show. It's kind of a. They. It's about a. Like a little area in eastern Tennessee kind of where. Kind of near where Tim is about just a bunch of folks who, you know, just go and sometimes kind of compete with each other for finding, like, interesting things at estate sales and, and different swaps so they can sell in their shops.
It's.
It's kind of fun because they definitely, like, roll up their sleeves and just dig into a lot of that and just see. See value where others might see junk.
Cool. Yeah.
Yeah, that's really cool.
Excellent. Well, thank you for joining us. Especially, you know, we have competition like the Washington Post and it's nighttime. So this is no small deal.
If people wanted to become a member of the American Pencil Collector Society or, you know, learn more about it, what would they do?
Yeah. So you'll go to our website. It is pencilcollector.org there's information out there about the club, as well as a membership application that you can fill out and send in. We would love to have you join us. We've got a convention coming up next summer, so we'd be excited to see you there.
And if you're thinking about becoming a member, spring for the extra charge to get the paper newsletter, because it is. I mean, it's just delightful. I just love it. Whenever it arrives, I read it front to back.
Absolutely.
So for folks who don't know, we have a Patreon that you can subscribe to for as little as $2 a month to support our efforts. And now we're recording more regularly, so. Yay. However, if you subscribe at the nubbin stage, then you are technically a producer, so we bid your name at the end of every episode. So big extra thanks to Dana Morris, Monica Corwin, Liz Bertundo, Melissa Miller, Angie Aaron Bollinger, Ivan Hearntz. I apologize if I ruined your name. Tara Whittle, Ida Umphurst, David Johnson, Phil Munson, Donnie Pierce, Tom Keakley, Andre Torres, Paul Moorhead, John Capilouti, Stephen Francali, Aaron Willard, Millie Blackwell, Michael Diallosa, Donna Feliz, Ann Site, Joe Crace, Michael Hagan, Bill Clow, Mary Collis, Kathleen Rogers, Kelton Wiens, Hans Noodleman, and John Wood. Thanks a lot. And next time is 200, so it's going to be awesome.
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