new pencil case.
new pencil crayons. (but only if last year’s Laurentiens are mostly stubs)
old pencil sharpener.
old compass. (I know! I can hardly believe it either. Also, here’s a link for those who haven’t a clue what I’m talking about. Used for drawing circles on notebooks and binders… & possibly had other applications.)
new eraser. (which will soon be tatooed with sharp end of lead pencil)
miscellaneous pens and pencils from kitchen cupboard near phone.
Hilroy notebooks. (which I WILL SWEAR to keep pristine ALL YEAR)
new binder (which I WILL SWEAR to keep pristine ALL YEAR)
binder paper
new set of dividers
(and in one spectacular year, a full colour metal Flintstones lunch box)
What am I missing??
♦♦
(greetings from the last century)
♦
Other (not always) wordless friends:
Cheryl Andrews
Allison Howard
Barbara Lambert
Allyson Latta
Elizabeth Yeoman
Matilda Magtree 
How about the paper that we used to make book covers for all our text books? Can you imagine anyone doing that now? I could never get them as neat as some people could. (Visiting from the last century.)
Yes, yes, yes!! I remember those covers. Whatever happened to them?
Oh the first thing your postcard text brought to mind was a symphony of smells. The almost “new car” smell of the pencil case when first unzipped, and before it takes on the illicit scent of a forgotten apple core; the crayons (each colour even seemed to me to small different as a child); the crisp pages of the notebook; and of course the smell of the pencil shavings! What a delight. And the compass! Hours of wonderful doodling ahead with the compass. All those marvellous and such hopeful items from, as you say, the century before.
The smells… I’d forgotten about that. The pencil case definitely had a distinctive, wonderful, *all mine and no one else’s* scent. How wonderfully you’ve described it all. Happy to conjure up the past like this… That first day of school feeling stays with us forever. Amazing, that.
The wooden ruler with your name engraved in ballpoint pen. You had to press really hard.
Of course! And the truly dedicated would add further engravings. I was dedicated. But not sure what I added.
I still buy myself new school supplies at the end of every summer. The tradition is to sweet to give up.