The Crayon Man

The True Story
of the Invention
of Crayola Crayons

Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
(pub. 3.19.2019) 
48 pages

A True Tale with
A Cherry On Top   

A uthor:  Natascha Biebow

 and illustrator: Steven Salerno
 
C haracter: Edwin Binney

O verview: 
     "What child doesn't love to hold a crayon in their hands? But children didn't always have such magical boxes of crayons. Before Edwin Binney set out to change things, most children couldn't afford colored crayons.
     Here's the true story of an inventor who so loved nature's vibrant colors that he found a way to bring the outside world to children - in a bright green box for only a nickel! With experimentation, and a special knack for listening, Edwin Binney and his dynamic team created one of the world's most enduring, best -loved childhood toys - Crayola crayons - empowering children around the world to imagine and draw ANYTHING!

T antalizing taste: 
     "In a large tub at the mill, Edwin's team measured out the ingredients:
                melted wax,
                       clay to thicken,
                                 something for texture, 
                                        colored powders,
each in just the right amount every time to make ... a top-secret formula.

... Finally, one summer evening in June 1903, Edwin came home covered in color, and announced that he'd invented a new kind of colored crayon.
     But what should he call it?
     Alice [his wife] had an idea.
     She said let's mix the French word craie for stick of chalk, and the word ola from the word oleaginous, meaning oily like the oily texture of the crayon wax, to invent a new word - Crayola."

And something more: The back matter of THE CRAYON MAN explains that the "successful Crayola business meant that Edwin and [his cousin] Harold could give back to the community. Edwin created a big park with flowers, trees, a pond, and playing fields in Old Greenwich, Connecticut.  And when times were tough during the Great Depression, Crayola factory workers kept their jobs and local farmers got work labeling and packing crayons."