Tales Of The Wild Wild West.

In the year eighteen fifty three a massive influx of clerical workers from Europe lead to a shortage of pencils and spawned the worlds first great pencil rush. Pencil fever swept the Wild West and men abandoned their gold mines and ranches to cash in.  The price of pencils soared to over twenty five cents a pound and agents from the East were willing to pay up front leading to cunning pencil men  ( known colloquially as "pencil Dicks") slyly producing heavier and heavier pencils. 

Things came to a head in eighteen fifty four when Gadfly& Guttersnipe, the largest stationer in New York City, Paid $35,000,000 for four hundred thousand tons of pencils and received a single four hundred thousand ton pencil made from a large sequoia.