Famous Freemason - John Eberhard Faber

John Eberhard Faber sometimes Johann Eberhard Faber; was a German-born American manufacturer of pencils in New York.

Faber in the village of Stein, near the city of Nuremberg, in Bavaria. His father, George Leonard Faber, was a descendant of the famous Faber family, one of ancient lineage in Bavaria engaged in the profession of manufacturing lead pencils.

He did his primary schooling at a Volksschule and then enrolled to study law at the University of Heidelberg. But he left his studies mid-way to pursue a career in commerce in America.

He moved to the United States in 1848 and opened a stationery store at 133 William Street in New York in 1849. He moved the store to 718-720 Broadway in 1877.

In 1852, he started to export red cedar logs to the Faber pencil factories in Stein, having realized that the red cedar available in America was ideal for lead pencils.

In 1861, he opened the first lead pencil factory along the East River, between 41st and 43rd streets, Midtown Manhattan. The factory was established under the name of Eberhard Faber. In 1872, a fire destroyed the factory in Manhattan, and the new Eberhard Faber Pencil Factory was built on a site on Kent and West streets in Greenpoint, Brooklyn. The new factory was designed for expansion and by the time Faber died his factory was the largest of its kind in United States and the Faber name was known all over the world. Now known as Faber-Castell the company remains the largest manufacturer of wood encased pencils in the world.

Faber died on March 2, 1879 in New York City. Faber is interred at Green-Wood Cemetery in Brooklyn, New York.

Bro. Faber was a member of Chancellor Walworth Lodge No.271, New York.