Pencil Sharpener: Conical Bore and a Reversible Triangular Blade (Moseley 1897)

The pocket pencil sharpener: twist the pencil in a conical hole and a blade along its side shaves the wood and lead to a point. Moseley made the body from plain round rod by drilling the cone at a slant, so the flat seat for the blade could be cut close to the rod's surface. His blade is longer than it needs to be: when the part that meets the lead wears, slide it along or turn it end for end. Source: William M. Moseley, US 578,577 (1897). Unknown: the metals and the sizes. Moseley gives the body as metal, hard rubber or the like, and no sizes or angles, so these are linked to unknown heads. Lathe and mill are ours. Picture: the patent's drawing.