Comments on: Staedtler’s oldest brands – the Atlas and Minerva pencils

By: Kevin

Kevin — Sun, 02 Oct 2011 10:23:45 +0000

The box of ’2B’ Minervas, Made in Thailand are superb pencils. For $4 a dozen they write/draw wonderfully well, are nicely finished and sharpen easily….and I adore the orange red case with very clear white lettering. I don’t say this lightly but they have a similar writing feel to a Palomino ‘HB’. They seem to be a class above other pencils in this price range, at least here in Australia. You can tell they are a member of a very distinguished pencil making company. The only thing I don’t like is the squared off end. When sharpening the pencil the end dis in to the palm of your hand which is quite a painful experience, big wuss that I am.

By: Koralatov

Koralatov — Wed, 09 Feb 2011 14:28:56 +0000

I got some of the Atlas pencils a while back on eBay. I liked the fact they were round, and the lead wasn’t bad, but they had terrible quality issues — the paint was extremely uneven in its application (thick at some parts, barely there on others), and the cores were seriously misaligned on more than half of the dozen I got. Overall, I wouldn’t recommend them at all; they’re far too hit-and-miss.

By: Michael

Michael — Fri, 08 Oct 2010 18:21:01 +0000

Joan, you’re right.
Before they became Berol and then Sanford, Venus was the quality pencil I knew. Staedtler and Faber-Castell might as well have been cities for all I knew.
Until I got interested in pencils for their own sake (and this site is to blame) ‘d never heard of Dixon or Palomino, let alone Blackwing.

By: Joan

Joan — Fri, 08 Oct 2010 16:11:17 +0000

It amazing how some pencils are unknown and strange for people living in a part of the planet and so common for the rest.
For me a Dixon Ticonderoga or a General Pencil Co. pencil is stranger than a pink Alien and the Minerva is the pencil everybody used to use when I was a school boy, here in Catalonia.

By: penciladmin

penciladmin — Wed, 25 Feb 2009 17:02:42 +0000

Thanks Strikethru, I wish it was true. Even if you can't read any German, everyone should check out Lexikaliker for some amazing pencil photos.

By: Strikethru

Strikethru — Wed, 25 Feb 2009 06:08:37 +0000

Your photographs are always so gorgeous.

By: penciladmin

penciladmin — Mon, 23 Feb 2009 05:11:18 +0000

Kiwi-d, the Pacific is an interesting complement to the Atlas and Minerva. I’ve been using all three – and apart from the round shape of the Atlas – there seem to be few differentiators. I can’t decide which has the best lead – probably the Pacific or Minerva.

By: Kiwi-d

Kiwi-d — Wed, 18 Feb 2009 06:33:57 +0000

Interesting. I do not believe we have either of these pencils “Down Under”, but the Staedtler Pacific would appear to fill the gap left by the absence of the Minerva. Would you care to comment on the similarities or otherwise of the Minerva and the Pacific?