Retro Review: Tru-Tone Crayons

Last weekend, Bob and I hit up our neighborhood yard sale day and came across an estate sale that included some vintage art supplies including this box set of Tru-Tone Broad Line Crayons from Milton Bradley. So these were probably made especially for kids or schools. The box even says “Certified School Crayons”.

Overall the packaging was in great condition and while some of the crayons were broken in half, the only crayon that was missing was the black. There was only two small pieces of the black.

The shape of these crayons is a flat rectangular shape so there are lots of edges to use for drawing and coloring.

The two images above show the full range of colors. There is actually a great range of colors in this set. When testing these, they definitely felt like a traditional wax crayon but the color deposit seemed a little better than a Crayola but its been years since I used a classic Crayola crayon so I’m just guessing here based on my memory. The big sticks of crayon is really fun to use and allows for a nice shading option.

Using the side of the crayon allowed me to shade in color and then used the corners or edges to create lines. Because of the shapes, its sometimes a little less precise then a round or pointed tool but it was sort of fun to be a little more loose and free with these.

While I don’t expect to use these a lot its so fun to see the quality of materials produced decades ago.

I did find a box of these crayons on Ebay at $7 right now in much better shape than the set I got.

Do you ever pick up old art or office supplies at thrift stores or yard sales? What was your best score? Share with us in the comments!