Years before the lead pencil was invented, Joseph Priestly found rubber could remove marks including those made by the pencils of 1770. For more than 200 years, man found countless uses for rubber erasers. They rub light rust away, remove spots and smudges on paint and wallpaper and take black heel marks off shiny, clean floors. Erasers can clean small electrical contacts, too, like those on doorbells or in the base and handsets of cordless phones. While erasers were invented in 1770 and lead pencils in 1795, it was quite a while before the two were put together. The first pencil with an attached eraser was patented in 1858. And that's the On The House tip for today.