I have a four-year-old nephew who is learning to write. Like any good uncle, I try to be available to help him by distracting him from his work with various forms of mischief. He helps bring out my inner child, not a difficult task in any case. Just recently I was tasked to buy him his first set of pencils since my brother-in-law was at work. I put the boy on my shoulders and we jaunted over to the pharmacy with songs and laughter. I knew before we arrived exactly what would fit the bill: the red-blooded American classic–the big, fat Ticonderoga pencil. Big enough for a small child to handle with dexterity, with a big fat eraser to correct errant doodling. Moving from the Ticonderoga to the slimmer, more delicate graphite pencil is a rite of passage of sorts. Then on to pens. Then to the less-satisfying experience of typing. The long journey of literacy begins, however, with a big, fat pencil. And when it comes to big, fat pencils, nothing beats the Ticonderoga.
Joseph Dixon (1799-1869)
The Ticonderoga wood and graphite pencil was developed by inventor Joseph Dixon, who developed his first pencil at age 13 in Salem, Massachusetts. He also developed innovative new processes for the mass manufacture of pencils, helping him build his small company into a powerhouse by the onset of the Civil War. The Union Army found his pencil very useful as it was a portable writing instrument and did not require supplying the Army with ink. By the time Dixon died in 1869, the Dixon Company was the largest consumer of graphite in the world. This is from an article in Good Houskeeping from 1894:
The most gratifying feature of this pencil industry is the fact that the American make is found vastly superior to the foreign or imported article. The Dixon pencils were first introduced into our schools in 1872 and their superiority over those of other manufacturers has been remembered during all the years that these school-day little ones have been becoming "children of a larger growth," until it is only truth to say, that not only everybody uses pencils, but that everybody uses the Dixon American graphite pencil.
Dixon's success allowed him to dig a graphite mine in Ticonderoga, NY. He also built a large, world-class factory at the other end of the Hudson River in Jersey City, NJ, that employed hundreds of workers. They made all sorts of things from graphite from paints to lubricants. The Ticonderoga pencil was made there for more than 100 years. The pencils I used when I was my nephew's age were made there.
None of this would have been possible without government. You see, what made the Hudson River valley an attractive place to open a business like the Dixon Company was the state chartered and financed development of the Erie Canal and a system of river navigation along the Hudson. The Dixon Company also was allowed to grow due to a system of protective tariffs, specifically on graphite pencils and other graphite products. Most importantly, the government had a national policy for the development of railroads. Dixon's company made a huge fortune supplying various graphite-based chemical products for railroads. The vast expansion of public schools in the 19th century created a demand for...you guessed it...pencils. The Dixon Company had a Schools Department and spent a great deal of time sponsoring events for teachers and pencil and crayon art exhibits for students. Furthermore, Joseph Dixon spoke often in the halls of government on behalf of public schools, especially for the Morrill Act which created so many of our universities. Joseph Dixon didn't invest someone else's money in a hedge fund and call himself a businessman. He built things. He made things. He built and made America. And it never would have happened without government.
In the 1980s, merger and acquisition mania struck the Dixon Company like so many other companies built by an American with an idea. It was merged and re-merged, re-engineered and restructured. It passed from one investment banking consortium to another. The factory closed in 1984. You can still buy a Ticonderoga pencil as I did for my nephew, but on the back it will say "Made in China." In 2007, the big, beautiful, old brick factory in Jersey City was turned into high-end loft condominium apartments. You can buy a one-bedroom for $345,000 and up. It has all the amenities an investment banker would want (gym, yoga room, sauna, etc.), including the convenience of being just a ferry ride to Wall Street. There are plenty of shops and sushi nearby. What was once a symbol of American ingenuity, American industriousness, and American wealth creation has become just another temple for the indulgence of yuppie self-perfection fantasies. The Dixon plant once bustled with energy and production. Now it is a just another mixed-use shrine for our hedonism and consumption. The worse thing is the new owners kept "Dixon Crucible Company" on the building. We can do faux factory, but not the real thing.
President Obama's gutsy decision to take out Osama bin Laden wasn't just a good call. If the reporting is correct, the president had a plan. During his campaign, he made it quite clear on repeat occasions that he would go after bin Laden and take him out. He was scorned by the Washington establishment for even speaking about this out loud. When he took office, he ordered the CIA to make this a top priority, turning it away from Iraq where George W. Bush had placed all his focus. On the ground, human intelligence gathering, not torture, yielded fruit. But instead of rushing in, he took his time and planned. Some nine months or so passed before he was finally ready to act. And when he did, he went big, choosing the riskiest operation that would yield the highest reward. And in the end, careful planning, good preparation and a clear mission turned the gods of luck to our favor. The President deserves every accolade being sent his way because this is the sort of leadership that we needed after September 11, 2001, when his predecessor dropped the ball and let bin Laden get away with murder.
What's the death of bin Laden have to do with the Ticonderoga pencil, you ask? America's primary problem, is NOT Al Qaeda terrorism. Al Qaeda is a danger, obviously. It has to be dealt with by good intelligence, special operations, and an equal or greater share of the lethality they seek to bring to our shores. But Al Qeada is not strong enough to destroy America. What is destroying America is not what happened on the east side of the Hudson River at Ground Zero, but what happened on the west side in Jersey City at the Dixon factory.
What is destroying America is our industrial wealth being steadily sent somewhere else. Our brightest people are drawn away from the innovation and building that Joseph Dixon represents. Instead of being Joseph Dixon, our best and brightest have become the sort of people who worked for him in the company office. Instead of creating the next generation of great things that last a century, we produce reality television and "financial instruments"...things that don't last a month in most cases. We can't even build tunnels under the Hudson River anymore because somehow the entire focus of national power has been turned from industrial production to yoga rooms. My nephew may never own a single thing in his home that was designed and produced by his countrymen. I worry for his future.
The President has now restored a great deal of his political capital. I hope that he uses it to address what's going on with the industrial decline of the United States and understands that Wall Street has no interest in ending it. The people who live in the old Dixon factory don't want to see their customized kitchens and $10,000 couches turned out so union manufacturing can return to America. The President is exactly right: we don't have time for silliness. We need leadership and focus. And planning and direction. And bold risk-taking and gutsy calls. An industrial plan for America will be second-guessed by the Washington establishment. It most certainly will be opposed by those getting fat off the carcass of what we used to be. But if there ever were a moment to turn the national pride and unity we all feel towards the most pressing problem of our time, it is right now. The President is right. We got bin Laden. We can do anything. Now, let's fix this economy by moving forward with bold, new industrial strategy. Let's not just win the future, let's build it.
(One more note about Dixon. When Joseph Dixon started his pencil company, he had several major competitors. One of them was the famed Faber-Castell Company founded in Germany in 1761. Faber-Castell was eclipsed by Dixon in pencils for a while, as they had been importing pencils to America. Even though Faber-Castell opened a factory in New York City in 1861, Dixon continued to dominate. Faber-Castell is now the global leader in pencil manufacturing. It is still owned by the same family that founded it. Although it produces a great deal of its products in Brazil, it still makes 100 million pencils per year in the same factory near Nuremburg where it was founded. Furthermore, they've figured out a way to use the pencil wood shavings to power the plant and avoid fossil fuels. The building also serves as the international headquarters for Faber-Castell and is not a luxury condo.)