Throwback Thursday: Vintage school stationery
By Abimbola Mohammed
In those days, the ritual of shopping for school was enjoyed by both parents (especially mothers) and the kids. The usual rendezvous of mothers and children meeting at the market and different stalls is a tradition that persists today. Where there is a marked difference is the gear making up the contents of pupils’ backpacks. For the millennials and the Gen Zees, let’s give you a sneak peek into the contents of the backpack of generations before you.
Olympic exercise book
This notebook was very common and the most popular exercise book in the 80s, it was built around the celebration of a great era of Nigeria’s sporting history; Emmanuel Ifeajuna, the first black man and Nigerian gold medalist at the British Commonwealth Games in 1954. This book was dedicated to this sporting icon.
The BIC Cristal
The BIC Cristal (stylised as BIC Cristal and also known as the Bic pen). This is the ‘biro’ that is every pupil’s introduction to writing in ink. It is an inexpensive, disposable ballpoint pen mass-produced and sold by Société Bic of Clichy, Hauts-de-Seine, France. It has become the archetypal ballpoint pen and is considered ubiquitous, to the extent that the Museum of Modern Art has made it a permanent part of its collection. Its hexagonal form and design mimic a standard pencil and it is sold in six types of point and 18 colours around the world.
Bic Four-Color Pens
Bic’s four-in-one pen was the elitist pen among students of the 70s and 80s. Click. Click sound it used to make as you changed from one colour tells fellow students you have joined the elitist club. How teachers hated that sound! Following its success across the world, the iconic pen remains on the market today and is even available in different versions.
Pop-a-Point Pencils
If Bic’s four-color pen had a pencil counterpart, it was the Pop-a-Point pencil. Popular around the same time, these pencils were filled with small plastic cartridges with sharp, graphite tips. As soon as the tip became too blunt, you pulled out the little cartridge, pushed it into a hole at the end of the pencil, and a new cartridge with a new writing tip popped forward.
Oxford mathematics set
Oxford mathematical set is a must-have for secondary school students in those days. When shopping for school, some things set apart the boys and girls (secondary school students) from the kids (primary school pupils). A mathematics set is one such school item.
HB pencil/2BHigh-quality
The Iconic Red and Black Staedtler Tradition are High quality pencils for writing, drawing, and sketching in HB. The degrees of hardness of pencils are roughly divided into four groups: B stands for “black”. These pencils are soft, H stands for “hard”, HB stands for “hard black”, which means “medium hard”, and F stands for “firm”. Do you know that the initials HB stand for Hard Black meaning it is of medium strength? That is why your 2B is not as hard and long-lasting as the HB. The key difference between 2B and HB pencils is that 2B pencils produce very dark lines while HB pencils produce medium line density.
Eraser
An eraser is an object used to remove pencil markings. it is made in different shapes, sizes, and colors and from various materials. Cheaper ones are made of synthetic soy-based gum or synthetic rubber while those of higher quality can be made from vinyl, plastic, or gum-like materials. Most common erasers are in block form or are placed at the end of the pencil for quick and easy use. There are barrel or click erasers which are built like mechanical pens that have an eraser as a core instead of lead.
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