Finn 6108 words 1
Flesh in Wax: Demystifying the Skin Colours of the Common Crayon1
Lorna Roth
Billy: What’s your favorite color?
Ellen: Flesh, like the Crayola color.
Billy: Didn’t the NEA [National Endowment for the Arts] cut off funding for that color?
Excerpt from an exchange between two characters on ABC’s thirtysomething episode broadcast in New York on 22 January 1991 (Dubin 1992: 316–7).
In the very early part of the twentieth century, when modern North American crayons were developed by Binney & Smith, makers of the Crayola brand (1903), visual materials and technologies aiming to represent or embellish human flesh tones had been commonly perceived as value-neutral, devoid of ideology—they were simply extensions or expressions of instrumental rationality. Over time, it has been revealed that this is simply not true (Comolli 1971, 1986; Winston 1996; Dyer 1997; Roth 2009). In this essay, I demonstrate that even in seemingly innocent tools of visual representation for children— art supplies such as crayons, markers, clay, and paint, used for decades to portray or depict people—we can distinguish an invisible norm of racial whiteness. This ideological norm has often become the barometer against which the flesh tones of Blacks, Asians, First
Peoples, and other Peoples of Colour can be read as a deviation.
The material in this chapter forms part of my larger book project, Colour Balance:
Reflections on Race, Representation and ‘Intelligent Design’, which examines the ways in which skin tones have been imagined, embedded, and colour-adjusted over time as manufacturers of technologies, software, and beauty products began to recognize that not all skin colours are within the Caucasian range. How do manufacturers respond to Finn 6108 words 2 globalization and to the current discursive politics of cultural and racial diversity? What can this study of the common crayon, which at first glance seems trivial, tell us about the politics of skin colour in North America?
Binney & Smith2, with headquarters in Easton, Pennsylvania, is a particularly interesting company to analyze in this regard, given its lengthy history and its initiative in the early 1990s to adapt its products to a multicultural and multiracial3 society. In this essay I describe and analyze the process by which Binney & Smith decided on several socially and politically important colour adjustments. Evidence from the Binney & Smith case is further used to argue that the way in which skin colour has been represented in our technologies and tools of visual imagery needs to be explicitly unpacked and examined, and then transformed to better reflect the multicultural and multiracial populations using these products. This is an ethical as well as a marketing issue. How long can a product stay in circulation when at a very deep cognitive level it promotes a vision of whiteness, an absence of any alternative skin tone possibilities? At what point does a manufacturer decide to recognize ‘Otherness’ as an essential design component of its products and media of representation?
A. Binney & Smith: A Heritage Company
In 1903, Binney & Smith launched its first box of eight Crayola wax crayons. Over time, the company extended its product lines to include poster, watercolour, and acrylic paints; fingerpaint; markers and pencils; modelling clay; paste and glue; and new assortments of crayons and chalk.
Colour heritage is an important foundation of users’ commitment to Binney & Smith products, which the company has used to its competitive advantage. For example, its Finn 6108 words 3 managers consider that the company gains value from the longevity of the visual design and colours of its famous yellow and green Crayola Crayon box. The names of Binney &
Smith’s product colours, and the company’s reputation for representing such traditional virtues as education, play, and safety are perceived as valuable assets as well.4 And, very important for sales in the crayon industry, Binney & Smith crayons have a highly nostalgic odour—an odour which triggers memories for adults of having grown up colouring their favourite images with these crayons. According to a study at Yale University, cited in an article in Colors magazine, ‘Crayola wax crayons have the eighteenth most recognized smell in the USA’ (December 98–January 99: 38).5 It is partially for these reasons, these associative links for adults, who want their children to recreate wonderful experiences with the same crayons they used themselves in their earlier years, that Binney & Smith often faces consumer resistance (and sometimes strong protest) to retiring or changing a colour, or changing the name of a colour.
In the last few decades, the company has become aware of the historical, social, and cultural implications of how its crayon colours are named. At the same time, managers and marketers have evolved a dual consciousness on product quality: (1) producing a consistently good colouring product and distributing it widely on the international market; and (2) ensuring that the product’s social, cultural, political, and other symbolic connotations reflect current levels of skin-colour awareness. This essay focuses on some of the company’s more public and controversial adjustments to colours of the common crayon. But first, I would like to situate Binney & Smith in relation to one of its main groups of supporters and critics—teachers.
A. Binney & Smith and Its Engagement with Educators Finn 6108 words 4
In the early twentieth century, Binney & Smith developed a subtle, yet very powerful in- service education and marketing strategy, which succeeded in firmly yoking together the smell of the wax crayon and the name Crayola. The company hired highly qualified art consultants, who visited schools to help teachers develop their art pedagogy. Of course, these consultants brought Binney & Smith products to the schools. Thus for the teachers, using Binney & Smith art products became associated with personal relationships and positive social experiences. One of Binney & Smith’s former presidents describes the company’s historical relationship with educators:
[catch block quotation]
Ultimately, the teachers are what built Crayola . . . . Years ago, we had fifteen
or so art consultants that went around the country . . . . ladies who were part
educators. They would spend three days putting on an art seminar on how to
use the product. They didn’t sell the product, they didn’t promote Binney &
Smith per se, but they used Binney & Smith products. They would show how
to use crayons and water colours and how to paint. The teachers used to love
that. We would have groups of fifty taking the workshop.
Having done that for twenty years, the reputation among schools of Binney &
Smith, with teachers coming into their classrooms, was positive. These
activities helped to build a gigantic network of loyalty. That is what made the
Crayola crayon, not advertising. Crayola really grew out of the educational
establishment. That lingers today. We don’t have the fifteen people going
around anymore. It is strictly trade advertising and shows these days, but that
heritage has hung on (Jack Kofed, former president of Binney & Smith, Finn 6108 words 5
personal interview, 12 June 1996).
[end block quotation]
Teachers and their national organizations have always been of primary importance to Binney & Smith. Although it no longer sponsors art workshops, except by special request,6 the company still uses teachers’ comments and feedback to stimulate innovation and to re-align key products to reflect changing social and cultural norms. Children, whose use and enjoyment of art materials informs teachers of their preferences and tastes, also provide information directly to Crayola designers and manufacturers. In an activity room at the Crayola Factory, ‘a combination museum, interactive theme park and simulacrum of the actual factory’ (Patton and Wojcik 1995: 45), children test new products and play with existing ones.7 But it is ultimately teachers who act as multi-channel informants to the company, identifying new trends in children’s art preferences and practices, and pointing out appropriate moments for strategic social shifts in product names and marketing policies.
A .Crayola’s Colour Adjustments Over the Years—An Overview
Several instances of colour adjustments stand out in Binney & Smith’s history.8 These shifts are listed below, with the company’s stated reasons, followed by a more focused analysis of context and implications related most directly to skin colour.
[B head]Prussian Blue Becomes Midnight Blue (1958)
This change occurred because teachers and students were no longer familiar with Prussian history.
[B head]Flesh Becomes Peach (1962)
As quoted in just about all of Binney & Smith literature, ‘the Crayola colour called “flesh” Finn 6108 words 6 was renamed “peach” in 1962, partly as a result of the civil rights movement’ (Binney &
Smith information pamphlet). This significant name change is analyzed in detail later in the chapter.
[B head]Eight Traditional Colours Replaced with New Colours (1990–1991)
Eight colours were ‘retired’ in both Canada and the US to a Crayon Hall of Fame in 1990, and were replaced by eight ‘hot’ colours in 1991. According to Binney & Smith’s market research, the retired colours were not popular enough to warrant continued production. In the words of Jack Kofed,
[catch block quotation]
So you cut the ones that are dead and slowing down. Before they die, you
give them a nice burial. If you wait until they die, then you have done damage
to your brand.
To be current with peoples’ feelings towards colours, you have to move into
what they like. You try to anticipate that or be with it and not be behind it,
because then some other guy does it while you are still putting out the old
colours and your business goes down (Personal interview with Jack Kofed,
12 June 1996).
[end block quotation]
The retirement of the eight traditional colours ‘from active duty’ (personal interview with Eric Zebley, 10 June 1996) caused a public uproar. At least three grassroots groups lobbied to retain the colours. These were CRAYON—the Committee to Re-establish
All Your Old Norms; the National Campaign to Save Lemon Yellow; and the Raw Umber and
Maize Preservation (RUMP) Society. They petitioned the company, organized letter Finn 6108 words 7 campaigns, and even picketed outside the company headquarters on the day that the colours to be retired were announced (personal interview with Eric Zebley, 10 June 1996).
Eventually, Binney & Smith brought the crayons back for nine months in 1991, in response to requests from the public for special, limited-time availability. It featured the box of 64 current colours along with the box of eight retired colours in a collector’s set (Ibid.). This strategy seemed to appease most protesters.
The retired colours are no longer available—in Eric Zebley’s words, ‘They are history’ (Ibid.). What does the fuss about their retirement tells us? What does it say about a desire for the restoration of a symbolic social order akin to the perceived normative structures of a certain kind of childhood? What does it tell us about tradition? About conservatism? About the role of the nostalgic in ordinary lives?
[B head] The ‘People Pack Multination’/‘My World Colours’ Collection Introduced (1991–
1992)
Beginning in the late 1980s, educators had asked Binney & Smith to produce a line of multicultural art products, to portray a full range of skin tones, since people are not black and white. In 1991, a ‘People Pack Multination’ collection of ‘My World Colours’ (later known as ‘Multicultural’) crayons was designed and launched. Binney & Smith had to rename its product, because another crayon manufacturer had had the same idea and had already trademarked the name ‘People Pack’.
Crayola multicultural products include
[catch bullet list]
• crayon colours—Sepia, Burnt Sienna, Mahogany, Tan, Peach (formerly known as Flesh), Apricot, Black, and White for blending Finn 6108 words 8
• washable paint colours—Brown, Mahogany, Terra Cotta, Olive, Bronze, Tan,
Beige, and Peach
• washable markers—Sienna, Mahogany, Terra Cotta, Bronze, Tawny, Golden
Beige, Beige, and Tan.
[end bullet list]
The introduction of the multicultural crayon collection is analyzed in more detail later in the chapter.
[B head]Indian Red Becomes Chestnut (1999)
Binney & Smith held a contest to select a less contentious, more politically correct name for
Indian Red. Indian Red, introduced in 1949, was
[catch block quote]
. . . originally based on a reddish-brown pigment commonly found near India.
But the manufacturer has gotten complaints from teachers who say students
think the colour has to do with North American Indians.
‘Little children take words and names very literally,’ said Louise Cosgrove, an
art teacher in Allentown. ‘They think Indian red is the colour of a Native
American’s skin’. (Associated Press 1999)
[end block quote]
In June 1999, it announced that Chestnut was the winner in the contest to rename
Indian Red.
A. The Story of How Flesh Became Peach9
A key question in this case study focused on the degree to which changing the colour name
Flesh to Peach was driven by concerted efforts of organized lobby groups of various Finn 6108 words 9 peoples of colour, whose skin tones clearly did not match that of the crayon called Flesh.
This crayon was a whitish, peachy colour that harmonized very well with a wide range of
Caucasian skin tones. In fact, the name suggested an equation between skin itself and whiteness, and in no way could the crayon be used to colour African-American, Asian,
Hispanic, North American Indian, or Inuit skin tone ranges. When I approached Binney &
Smith, I found that they, like most companies, had not kept an archive of textual materials from the 1960s (for example, letters from customers or company policy records), so I have had to rely on oral histories as my main source of information for my investigation. These multiple narratives have been woven together into this partially coherent perspective of the period.
The first name change, in 1962, from Flesh (named in 1949) to Peach seems more important than Binney & Smith’s other colour adjustments, perhaps because it was the first public recognition of the embeddedness of the notion of race in such an ordinary product as the wax crayon. Clearly, the decision to change the name was made not only because market research indicated a ‘preference’ for one name over the other. The situation was more complicated.
As I researched the network of people involved in this decision, I was told about
Rosemarie P. Mandarino, an art consultant working for Binney & Smith at the time. In a letter, she responded to my queries about the name change:
[catch block quotation]
To the best of my recollection, the change took place sometime in the mid
fifties. The Civil Rights movement was in full flood with great stress on
raising self-esteem in the Black community. ‘Black is beautiful’ was a phrase Finn 6108 words 10
used repeatedly and especially to Black children. When these children
opened their boxes of crayons to colour with, they, their teachers and
parents, became very aware that the colour called Flesh did not represent
theirs.
As a consequence, the mail being received at the corporate offices of Binney
& Smith, Inc., then located in New York City, included many letters protesting
the use of Flesh as a colour name since it portrayed a Caucasian skin tone,
which obviously was not theirs. The officers of the company, after
consultation with and input from their staff of artists, colour chemists, and
art consultants agreed they had a valid point and made the decision to change
the name.
The colour itself was not part of the basic 16-colour Colour Wheel, but one of
the additional colours that filled a particular need. Since blending tints and
shades of colours with wax crayon is difficult, especially for children, colours
such as Flesh, Sky Blue and others, were formulated and added to the various
assortments. Colour names such as Red, Blue, and Yellow were taken from
the colour spectrum. Prussian Blue, Carmine Red etc. came from artist paint
colours; some from their resemblance to flowers and fruits and some for
direct usage; to colour sky or skin. I assume the colour name Flesh was
formulated to depict a Caucasian skin tone in a time when that was
considered correct as a way to answer a specific need for colouring with a
wax crayon.
The selection of the name Peach to replace Flesh was chosen after referring Finn 6108 words 11
to the United States Catalogue of Standardized Colour Names. I’m not sure of
the title of this volume but I know it was part of the colour labs and the
library and was heavily relied upon. There were a number of names listed to
describe the colour. One of these was Peach. It was chosen after a consensus
of opinions from the aforementioned staff. Since that time, names for many of
the crayon colours have changed. You will no longer find Prussian Blue or
Carmine Red. In some instances, the actual colour was reformulated to
answer the changing needs and tastes of the users; the teachers, artists and,
most importantly, the children (Rosemarie P. Mandarino, retired colour/arts
consultant, Binney & Smith, personal correspondence, 9 July 1996).
[end block quotation]
The change from Flesh to Peach was made essentially for reasons of social justice and racial equity, and it made good moral sense in a period of United States history in which the civil rights movement was beginning to make political and constitutional gains.
The retirement of Flesh recognized a clear ideological and racial bias embedded in the product concept, and Binney & Smith sought to correct it.
This is not to say that Binney & Smith deliberately or consciously designed its products with a racist bias. My point, rather, is to identify a pervasive dominant cognitive belief system around race, a racial unconsciousness embedded within North American business and manufacturing practices at the time. Corporate America, until very recently, has created and marketed products of colour reflecting ‘white flesh’ tones as if they were the only existing ones. Binney & Smith, in its interpretation of the colour Flesh as white, was little different from the majority of North America- and Europe-based companies Finn 6108 words 12 producing consumer items for a market that was mostly Caucasian. Indeed, compared with manufacturers of other products such as flesh-tone bandages and nylon stockings—whose selection of flesh colours for the longest time reflected a range of Caucasian skin tones—or with popular US-based cosmetics companies, which only relatively recently added an array of shades for Peoples of Colour, Binney & Smith was quick to shift its social contours in response to public pressures circulating in the late 1950s and early 1960s. Of course, from a marketing perspective, it made impeccable sense to correct the labelling of the colour
Flesh and acknowledge of the physical, material evidence that the product had indeed been misnamed in the first instance.
A. The Multicultural Crayon Collection—A Change in the Spirit of the Times
‘As far as I and other people in the company knew, it was just a decision that
we decided to make in the spirit of the times’ (Telephone interview with Tad
Girdler, 25 June 1996).
Having renamed the colour Flesh in 1962, Binney & Smith might have been expected to soon produce a series of other colours to further reflect its public recognition of diverse skin tones. However, there was a notable gap of almost 30 years between the re-labelling of
Flesh to Peach and the launching of the ‘multicultural’ products. Why did it take so long for
Binney & Smith to mark race as an integral feature of its colour palettes? Furthermore, what was it that convinced the company that the early 1990s was the right time to adapt its merchandise to more diverse representational practices?
To the best of my knowledge, based on document research, interviews, and textual analysis, there was no concerted formal lobby group made up of members of the general public that mounted a campaign to persuade Binney & Smith to make its products reflect a Finn 6108 words 13 multicultural and multiracial world. User groups did interact with Binney & Smith public relations officers, but in an ad hoc manner. In this interview extract, an employee at the time remembers the kind of public feedback he heard about in the 1980s:
Typically, the general public would call in and say, ‘Why don’t you come up
with some crayons that would be appropriate for People of Colour?’ or
something like that. Nothing beyond that. There was no mass lobbying or
anything, or people protesting . . . (Personal interview with Eric Zebley, 10
June 1996).
But there were letters and comments from teachers, with whom Binney & Smith did have a special relationship and who strongly contributed to the company’s decision-making processes.
How many phone calls and letters were needed for the company to pay attention to its consumers’ requests? At what point did the company’s recognition of such a progressive subject as diversity become a positive offering of a range of alternatives, rather than a negative and passive retreat from potential criticism? What critical factors led Binney &
Smith to consider changing corporate policy so that their products would reflect a shift in the cultural, racial, and social norms of society? In other words, why at that time?
The colours useful in representing the skin, eyes, and hair of all peoples were already available in several Binney & Smith boxed crayon collections. Why, then, did the company in 1990 market these colours as a separate multicultural package? Unfortunately,
I cannot provide a definitive response. I can remind the reader, however, that multiculturalism was in the air at the time; that the civil rights movement had made important inroads into the education system; that in the mid 1980s educational curricula Finn 6108 words 14 began to incorporate African-American, First Peoples, and various other ethnic, historical, and cultural studies; that, as non-Caucasian stories and people began to be privileged within the media, norms of whiteness began to be challenged as exclusionary; and that the logic of capitalism in a global market entailed a necessary colour adjustment to accommodate the multi-coloured bodies and biases of people around the world. Perhaps also, what Raymond Williams calls the ‘structures of feeling’ of the period contributed to
Binney & Smith’s decision to multiply its tools of skin-tone reproduction (Williams 1977:
128–35). Certainly, all these factors point to an irreversible social and perceptual shift.
Binney & Smith moved with the spirit of the time, but it only moved so far . . . and then waited for consumer responses.
Company planning for multicultural products began in 1990, and by 1991, boxes of crayons appropriate for various colours of skin, hair, and eyes were ready to be launched.
Their first targeted market was educators; their second was retail customers, where the new collection ‘lasted about a year and a half’ (Personal interview with Eric Zebley, 10 June
1996).
From my interviews, it is clear that teachers’ requests were a decisive factor in
Binney & Smith’s decision to produce the collection, so that children would be able to accurately draw, paint, and mark their own images in all their varieties of skin colour. In a prominent leaflet outlining their multicultural products, subtitled Helping Children See
Themselves and their World, Binney & Smith describe educators’ reasons for wanting the collection:
[catch block quotation]
Educators have asked Binney and Smith to produce a line of multicultural art Finn 6108 words 15
products, in a full range of skin tones, since people are not black and white. It
strengthens children’s comfort with who they are when they can draw
themselves in colours that truly reflect their complexions. When children are
given boxes of crayons and markers that have a variety of skin tones, it
enables and encourages them to draw a diverse community, recognizing the
ethnic diversity around them (Crayola Multicultural Products: Helping
Children See Themselves and their World, n.d.: 1).
[end block quotation]
To facilitate art teachers’ use of the new collection, pedagogical materials were developed by Binney & Smith consultants, which were distributed in schools throughout
North America. These materials include lesson plans, model designs, and other curricular variations for lessons on diversity issues, which teachers have found very useful.
Less understandable is Binney & Smith’s decision not to market these same products in the same way to the retail market, by providing similar support materials to parents and families. Thus, although Binney & Smith is to be praised for its positive social intervention in what appears to have been a low-profile lobbying effort by educators, one wonders about the lack of proactive marketing to retail customers.
A. What Is the Message of the Flesh-in-Wax Product Line?
What can we conclude from the Binney & Smith case study in light of Marshall
McLuhan’s well-known comment that ‘the medium is the message’? What is the message of
Binney & Smith’s visual art materials over the last several decades, and what does it say about our perceptions of our bodies as colour-marked citizens in North American society?
What racial colour options could we have used to draw before 1962, and then again, before Finn 6108 words 16
1992? What colours can we now choose with which to represent ourselves?
The decision to rename Flesh in 1962 and the 1992 launching of the multicultural collection opened up many possibilities for non-Caucasian users of Crayola products. First, it indicated the potential to reconceptualize the colour of one’s body on paper. Second, it legitimized body colours that in the past had been marginalized, those of brown and black bodies. Finally, broader notions of pigment variation suggested new ways of looking at and critiquing our societies’ white-biased body norms. These alternative strategies of seeing may thus provoke a concurrent shift in our standards of beauty regarding colour and race.
What can we conclude from Binney & Smith’s initially passive retail marketing strategy? Was diversity to exist only within the walls of the schoolhouse? What happens to multiculturalism at home? Why was there a two-tiered system of integration—one for the school and one for the streets? Was this sectoralism a wise strategy? Although the multicultural crayon collection is now slightly more available to the average consumer than when it was launched, it is still not widely visible. One has to hunt to find them in ordinary venues where crayons are sold. I have not yet seen a box of multicultural crayons in a pharmacy or a dollar store in Montreal. When will notions and products reflecting a multicultural and multiracial perspective permanently and visibly migrate into storefront
North America?
Binney & Smith’s colour adjustments are historically significant. They may seem small and trivial, but they denote a powerful shift in the tools used to study, draw, and represent the human body on paper. The products are generally targeted at children of a vulnerable age, when they first begin to record their perceptions of the social, cultural, and political bodies and institutions in which they live. Splitting the colour palette in two—for Finn 6108 words 17 the educational and the retail sectors—may very well, though not necessarily, have triggered a corresponding split in race consciousness with deeper implications for future sociocultural and political relations.
Is the apparently politically innocent crayon just a crayon? My contention in taking on this topic is that it is more than just a crayon. When notions of skin colour are embedded within an everyday object such as a crayon, we begin to see what society is teaching its children. Its values and dominant perspectives on race and culture become apparent.
Margaret Visser (1986) notably writes: ‘The extent to which we take everyday objects for granted is the precise extent to which they govern and inform our lives.’ If we read a society symptomatically, that is, if we look at the range of products, signs, and symbols on its surface in search of a deeper meaning, we can begin to take seriously what at first appear to be insignificant play tools, one of which is the common crayon.
A. Cognitive Equity: Toward an Embedded Normative Range of Skin Tones
Reaching beyond the current critique of whiteness (Winston 1996 and Dyer 1997, for example), this case study begins to document evidence for an original conceptual notion that I am calling ‘cognitive equity’—a new way of understanding racial and cultural equity.
This notion doesn’t revolve around statistics and access to institutions, but rather inscribes a vision of skin colour equity into technologies, products, and body representations in a range of visual media. It is particularly important that cognitive equity be designed into young children’s visual culture and commodities to reinforce multiculturalism and multiracialism, because stereotypes and racisms are formed and reinforced very early in a child’s cognitive and cultural development. Finn 6108 words 18
Finally, to allow current technologies and visual portrayals to represent a wide range of skin tones, my work suggests two strategies that would better enable children to develop racial and cognitive equity: (1) design technologies, images, and products so that it becomes easier to capture and reproduce a continuum of skin tones without having to resort to (often unsatisfactory) methods of compensation; and (2) develop a wider range of skin-colour norms in body representations, so that this broad range itself becomes the standard, the new norm, for portraying and depicting bodies in the arts, in business, and in all media—whether virtual or two- or three-dimensional—for portraying and depicting bodies.
As more and more manufacturers and creative producers explicitly acknowledge the skin-tone values they are working with and reinforcing in the minds of their customers and audiences, and as they begin to tackle the complexities of the colour adjustment process, we hopefully shall note a wider public recognition and acceptance of multiracialism. Of course, there are no guarantees that implementing my suggested strategies of change in design prototypes would automatically help children to develop cognitive equity. This development would also require complementary changes in school curricula, in the global manufacturing economy, and in discourses about diversity at school, at home, on the streets, in stores, and in the media.
As challenging as it may be to achieve this shift, the establishment of a colour continuum—rather than the retention of whiteness as a default reference point for skin colour reproduction—would be an important starting point from which children could begin to perceive, categorize, and think about race and ethnicity differently. Most importantly, it would further promote an environment where stereotypical notions of skin Finn 6108 words 19 colour, however unconscious, could be eliminated from the moment of inscription, so that they may no longer be so easily repeatable (Greenberg 2009).10
Appendix A
[A head]Crayola Crayon Colour History11
[formatter: please set the lists in this section in three columns]
[B head]Colours Available in 1903
Black
Blue
Brown
Green
Orange
Red
Violet
Yellow
[B head]Colours Available 1949–1957
Apricot
Bittersweet Gray
Black
Blue
Blue Green
Blue Violet
Brick Red
Brown Finn 6108 words 20
Burnt Sienna
Carnation Pink
Cornflower
Flesh*
Gold
Green
Green Blue
Green Yellow
Lemon Yellow
Magenta
Mahogany
Maize
Maroon
Melon
Olive Green
Orange
Orange Red
Orange Yellow
Orchid
Periwinkle
Pine Green
Prussian Blue**
Red Finn 6108 words 21
Red Orange
Red Violet
Salmon
Sea Green
Silver
Spring Green
Tan
Thistle
Turquoise Blue
Violet (Purple)
Violet Blue
Violet Red
White
Yellow
Yellow Green
Yellow Orange
[B head]Colours Available 1958–1971
All 48 colours previously listed plus the following 16 colours added in 1958.
Aquamarine
Blue Gray
Burnt Orange
Cadet Blue
Copper Finn 6108 words 22
Forest Green
Goldenrod
Indian Red***
Lavender
Mulberry
Navy Blue
Plum
Raw Sienna
Raw Umber
Sepia
Sky Blue
* Name voluntarily changed to Peach in 1962, partially as a result of the Civil Rights
Movement.
** Name changed to Midnight Blue in 1958 in response to teachers’ requests.
*** Name changed in 1999 to Chestnut.
[B head]Colours Available 1972–1989
All colours previously listed plus the following fluorescent colours added in 1972.
Chartreuse
Hot Magenta
Ultra Blue
Ultra Green
Ultra Orange
Ultra Pink Finn 6108 words 23
Ultra Red
Ultra Yellow
[B head]Fluorescent colour names changed in 1990
Atomic Tangerine
Blizzard Blue
Hot Magenta
Laser Lemon
Outrageous Orange
Screamin’ Green
Shocking Pink Wild Watermelon
[B head]Colours Available 1990–1992
All 72 colours previously listed plus the following eight fluorescent colours.
Electric Lime
Magic Mint
Purple Pizzaz
Neon Carrot
Radical Red
Razzle Dazzle Rose
Sunglow
Unmellow Yellow
[B head] Retired Colours
In 1990, Binney & Smith (US) retired eight colours and introduced eight new ones. Around the same time, Binney & Smith (Canada) conducted a national poll asking consumers to Finn 6108 words 24 decide which eight colours should be retired. In February 1992, eight colours were retired in each country; in Canada three of the eight were different from those retired in the US.
[C head]Canada Retired Colours
Blue Gray
Cadet Blue
Goldenrod
Maize
Orange Red
Orange Yellow
Raw Umber
Yellow Orange
[C head]U.S. Retired Colours
Blue Gray
Green Blue
Lemon Yellow
Maize
Orange Red
Orange Yellow
Raw Umber
Violet Blue
[C head]New Colours
Cerulean Finn 6108 words 25
Dandelion
Fuchsia
Jungle Green
Royal Purple
Teal Blue
Vivid Tangerine
Wild Strawberry
[B head]Colours Available in 1993
All 80 colours previously listed plus the following 16 colours added in 1993, named by US and Canadian consumers, for a grand total of 96 colours.
Asparagus
Cerise
Denim
Granny Smith Apple
Macaroni and Cheese
Mauvelous
Pacific Blue
Purple Mountain’s Majesty
Razzmattazz
Robin’s Egg Blue
Shamrock
Tickle Me Pink Finn 6108 words 26
Timber Wolf
Tropical Rain Forest
Tumbleweed
Wisteria
[B head]Colours Available 1998
24 new colours added
Almond
Antique Brass
Banana Mania
Beaver Blush
Blue Bell
Canary
Caribbean Green
Cotton Candy
Desert Sand
Eggplant
Fern
Fuzzy Wuzzy Brown
Mountain Meadow
Outer Space
Piggy Pink
Pink Flamingo
Pink Sherbet Finn 6108 words 27
Purple Heart
Shadow
Sunset Orange
Torch Red
Vivid Violet
[B head]Colours Available 2000
All colours previously listed with the following exceptions: Thistle was removed from the
120-count assortment to make room for Indigo; Torch Red was renamed Scarlet.
[B head]Colours Available 2003
4 new colours added, 4 retired
Number of Colours: 120
[C head]New Colours
Inch Worm
Jazzberry Jam
Mango Tango
Wild Blue Yonder
[C head]Retired Colours
Blizzard Blue
Magic Mint
Mulberry
Teal Blue
[A head]Notes Finn 6108 words 28
1. This essay is an expanded version of ‘Home on the Range: Kids, Visual Culture, and Cognitive Equity’, originally published in Cultural Studies and Critical Methodologies 9, 2 (April 2009), 141–8. 2. Although Binney & Smith’s name is now officially Crayola and has been so since 2007, I am using its original name, since the events described in this essay all took place before it was renamed. 3. In my own work, I differentiate between the terms multicultural and multiracial in the following way. Multicultural(ism) can refer to cultural and ethnic backgrounds exclusively and does not include the range of skin colours, that is covered in the term multiracial(ism). However, the way in which the term is used by Binney & Smith, and many others I might add, indicates a conflation of the two terms under the heading of multiculturalism.
4. According to a 1995 article in The International Design Magazine, Binney & Smith’s Crayola crayons have a 99 per cent brand recognition and higher sales than any electronic toy sold in the US up to that time (Patton and Wojcik 1995: 41).
5. For interest’s sake, the first two are coffee and peanut butter (Ibid.).
6. This cutback on in-service training was due mainly to two factors: a) the fact that a large pool of school teachers, involved in the American Federation of Teachers began to refuse to do extra work, unless they got paid for it; and b) it became increasingly hard to find a room in the schools that could be closed off from all other activities for three days to do the workshops (personal interview with Tad Girdler, 25 June 1996).
7. Prior to the opening of the Crayola Factory in mid-1996, designers’ main source of children’s feedback was derived from school visits to the actual factory located in Easton, Pennsylvania.
8 For a complete list of Crayola Crayon’s colour names and the years in which they developed as part of Binney & Smith’s colour palette, see Appendix A.
9. In June of 1996, I visited the Binney & Smith headquarters in Easton, Pennsylvania, to interview the staff and to attain a richer and deeper understanding of the complexities involved in the colour-change decisions made in relation to skin colours. Much of the material that I detail in this essay is derived from these personal conversations, as well as from phone interviews with retired employees undertaken at a slightly later time, and written correspondence.
10. This statement by Reesa Greenberg (2009) was her response to my notion of cognitive equity that she initially read about in my first version of this article. I found it to be quite fascinating and useful in furthering my own thinking about the concept.
11. Source: http://www.crayola.com/colorcensus/history/chronology.cfm.
Finn 6108 words 29
A. Works and Documents Cited
Associated Press. 1999. ‘Crayola renames touchy shade of red’. The Gazette (Montreal)
March 11: C-3.
Binney & Smith. ‘Crayola Crayon Chronology’. Available at: http://www.crayola.com/colorcensus/history/chronology.cfm.
Binney & Smith. n.d. Crayola Multicultural Products: Helping Children See Themselves and
their World.
Binney & Smith. n.d. Crayola Information Pamphlet.
Comolli, Jean-Louis. 1971. ‘Technique et Idéologie: Caméra, perspective, profonduer de
champ’. Cahiers du Cinéma 229 (May): 4–21; 230 (July): 51–7; 231 (August–
September): 42–9; 233 (November): 39–45; 234–5 (December, January, February): 94–
100.
Comolli, Jean-Louis. 1977. ‘Technique and Ideology: Camera, Perspective, Depth of Field’. In
Patricia Erens and Bill Horrigan (eds), Film Reader 2: 128–40. Evanston, Illinois:
Northwestern University.
Dubin, Steven C. 1992. Arresting Images: Impolitic Art and Uncivil Actions. New York:
Routledge Press.
Dyer, Richard. 1997. White. London: Routledge, 1997.
Greenberg, Reesa. 2009. ‘”Remembering Exhibitions”: From Point to Line to Web’. Tate
Papers (Autumn). Available at:
http://www.tate.org.uk/research/tateresearch/tatepapers/09autumn/greenberg.shtm
. Accessed June 2010.
‘Race. Flesh’. 1999. Colors December 1998–January 1999: 38. Finn 6108 words 30
Patton, Phil, and James Wojcik. 1995. ‘The Business of Colour’. The International Design
Magazine (November): 40–7.
Roth, Lorna. 2009. ‘Home on the Range: Kids, Visual Culture, and Cognitive Equity’. Cultural
Studies and Critical Methodologies 9, 2 (April): 141–8.
Visser, Margaret. 1986. Much Depends on Dinner. Toronto: McClelland and Stewart.
Williams, Raymond. 1977. Marxism and Literature. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Winston, Brian. 1996. Technologies of Seeing: Photography, Cinematography and Television.
London: British Film Institute.
Personal interviews at Binney & Smith headquarters in Easton, Pennsylvania:
Dana Conover, 10 June 1996
Brett Wilson, 10 June 1996
Eric Zebley, 10 June 1996
Herman Reich, 11 June 1996
Rachel Strauss, 11 June 1996
Jack Kofed, 12 June 1996
Telephone interview with former employee:
Tad Girdler, 25 June 1996.
Correspondence with former employee:
Rosemarie P. Mandarino, 9 July 1996