Does anyone here know the story behind the Colleen logo? It’s kind of whimsical… this triangular head of some guy who isn’t smiling or frowning… in a good mood? Contemplative? In wonder? Who knows. 
There’s another variant too. Cuirassier uses it for his logo here and on his blog. But, his version has a teeth exposed grin. There was actually a Yahoo auction for that very face, which I’m now thinking was a Colleen variant at some point?
“Founded in 1916, the Colleen Pencil Company was once one of Japan’s top three pencil makers alongside Mitsubishi and TOMBOW, but it liquidated its assets and went out of business in 1997.”
– That was from Colleen 3600 Floral - Vintage Pencils - Pencilly Australia. Now, one could say wait a minute… what about Pentel, Pilot, Platinum, and so on? Well, Mitsubishi Pencil Co got its start in 1887 [LINK], as “Masaki Pencil Manufacturing Company”. After WWII, it was renamed to Mitsubishi Pencil Company. The Tombow Pencil Company got started in 1913. So yeah… Colleen was very early into the writing instrument game for mechanical pencils. Pentel was founded in 1946 as “Japan Stationery Limited”, just after WWII. It started with pastels and crayons, then got into pencils in 1960. By 1971, the company was then known as “Pentel Co. Ltd.” And PILOT… well, iit was founded in 1918 as the Namiki Manufacturing Company, producing gold nibs for pens. In 1938 the name changed to Pilot Pen Co., Ltd. By 1960, PILOT was operating as a broad corporation with subsidiaries and a new subsidiary for mechanical pencils was made that year called “Mizuho Kiko Co,” later “PILOT Kiko Co.”
By the way, NEWMAN got started in the late 1950’s as a writing instrument company and amazingly was the first to introduce an 0.2 mm mechanical pencil, in 1971. Pentel Co would follow 2 years later with their first mechanical pencil in the 0.2 mm lead size.
So how about that? A little history class today. And thankfully, no pop quizzes.