Laizhou is located in the western part of Jiaodong Peninsula. It has both land and sea, and is located in an important transportation area. As recorded in the county annals: "Laizhou County is surrounded by mountains and seas, and is a famous territory of Bohai Sea and a huge town of Sanqi". Sima Qian said: "It is a metropolis between Haidai, and I have seen it in Ye!" The superior geographical location and relatively open mechanism, coupled with the fact that Laizhou has always been a place where calligraphers and painters have gathered, and talents have emerged in large numbers, providing various opportunities and possibilities for the prosperity and development of Laizhou brushes. The long historical accumulation and splendid cultural tradition have played a strong role in promoting the prosperity and development of Laizhou brush production. Miaojia Town, Laizhou City is the main production area of brushes, and the surrounding areas of Liangguo are also the main production areas of brushes. Laizhou brushes are traditional craft products of Ye County with a history of nearly 400 years. They were once one of the four major tributes in the local area. During the reign of Emperor Kangxi of the Qing Dynasty, Ye County had a pen-making workshop engaged in professional production. After the founding of the People's Republic of China, on the basis of inheriting traditional crafts, it has learned from the strengths of domestic and foreign brush production. After innovation and development, the variety has continued to increase, the quality has been significantly improved, and it has a high reputation in the domestic and foreign markets. Making brushes is a traditional family handicraft in Miaojia Town (formerly Baowang Township, Ye County). Brushes were made here as early as the early Qing Dynasty. On the eve of liberation, there were five brush shops in Tianjin founded by brush workers in Baowang Township, including "Huashengtang Brush Shop" founded by Mr. Zhang Keshun, "Junchanghou Brush Shop" founded by brothers Chi Junsheng and Chi Changsheng, "Shengshanzhai Brush Shop" and "Chengwentang Brush Shop"; there are also "Tongji Brush Shop" in Dalian, "Wuxing Brush Shop" in Harbin, "Niuzhuang Brush Shop" in Haicheng, and brush shops in Beijing, Baoding, Yi County, Hebei, etc. Mr. Jiang Yanling, an old brush worker in Jiangjia Village, Baowang, taught brush making skills in Zhangjiakou City, Hebei Province around 1940, and then returned to his hometown. Laizhou brushes have been handed down from generation to generation. According to modern people, the inheritors in the Qing Dynasty are no longer verifiable. The current outstanding inheritors - Li Zhaozhi (62 years old) and Liu Guangsheng (41 years old) are good at mastering the true method of making brushes and have superb brush skills. Teng Yanfu, Teng Zhanzuo and others are also well-versed in this area. After the founding of the People's Republic of China, in 1972, Miaojia Commune took the lead in organizing the scattered brush-making artists and established the Miaojia Brush Factory. The Miaojia Brush Factory fully utilizes the technical advantages of the family workshops in Miaojia Town, follows the traditional hand-made craftsmanship, and uses the natural resource advantages of the weasel tail hair of the Laizhou Bay coast, which is no less than the Jingdong tail. With the help of high-quality Northeast Yuanwei and raccoon needle hair, it produces various high-quality wolf hair brushes and mixed hair brushes; it also humbly learns the production experience of Hu brushes and Xuan brushes, draws on the strengths of many others, and produces long-pointed sheep hair brushes with enhanced pen waist strength, which are deeply loved by calligraphers and painters and amateur enthusiasts. In 1978, Comrade Liu Haisu visited Japan and selected the Taishan brand brush produced by the factory as a gift to the Japanese emperor. In the second national brush quality evaluation in 1982, it won the highest total score and was known as the "No. 1 Brush". The "No. 1 Brush" was favored by many calligraphers. On October 29, 1983, Mr. Liu Haisu, the 88-year-old founder of modern art education in my country, the pioneer of the new art movement, the outstanding art educator, the master of painting, and the master of calligraphy, who is well-known both at home and abroad, visited the Ye County Pen Factory with his wife Xia Yiqiao and wrote the eight characters "Ye Pen Vertical and Horizontal, Cicada Shedding Dragon Transformation". His wife Xia Yiqiao is a member of the Shanghai Artists Association and the Calligraphers Association, and wrote the four characters "Pen Singing and Ink Dancing" for the pen factory. After that, calligraphers and painters who came here in droves. From material selection to production, Laizhou brushes go through more than 120 processes, including selection, matching, padding, combing, rounding, trimming, and stroking. They mainly include five major processes: material selection, water basin (material distribution, material lifting, degreasing, combing, straightening, cleaning, rounding, tying, etc.), brush trimming, lettering, and packaging. Among the processes, the water basin and brush trimming are the most complicated. The brush head is made of high-quality big yellow wolf tail hair from the Northeast, with an appropriate amount of civet tail hair, beardless hair, badger needle, raccoon chest hair, wool, chicken hair and other fine tail hair. After more than 100 processes, it is hand-made. Laizhou brushes have more than 290 specifications and more than 400 varieties. According to the length of the head, there are large regular script, medium regular script, and small regular script; according to the material of the brush head, there are wolf hair, sheep hair, mixed hair, purple hair (mountain rabbit hair), golden chicken hair, badger hair and fetal hair brush; according to the purpose, there are writing brushes, painting brushes, image repair pens, eyebrow pencils, etc. The pen holder is made of famous bamboos such as Xiangfei, Fujian Fengyan, etc., which are produced in Hunan, my country, and inlaid with black and shiny buffalo horns produced in Guangdong and Guangxi, and the pen holder and pen top made of fine jade. The pen tip is sharp and slender, and the writing is fluent. It is soft but not soft, strong but implicit, durable and wear-resistant, and has the four virtues of "round, strong, sharp and neat". The representative variety of Laizhou brushes is wolf hair brush. The wolf hair brushes produced in Laizhou use high-quality weasel tails, which are produced in the cold regions of North China and Northeast China, as the main raw material. The surface of the authentic Laizhou wolf hair brush is light yellow or slightly red, and the color is consistent and shiny. When used with ink, the tip of the brush feels both flexible and strong like a sheep hair brush, with a slender tip, not scattered, not divided, not split, wear-resistant and long life. Especially the Zhongkai wolf hair brush, which is made of the Northeast Dayuanwei hair harvested in the middle of winter. The finished brush head is bright yellow in color, the hair shaft is thick, straight and smooth, slender and soft, generally up to 4 cm long, and feels both hard and soft, which is a treasure among wolf hair brushes. Laizhou brushes have won more and more reputation in the domestic and foreign markets. The Chinese Painting Academy, which is responsible for the national brush quality evaluation and signing tasks, evaluates Laizhou brushes as follows: they can be used for meticulous and freehand Chinese painting, freehand figures, flowers and birds, moderate water absorption, elasticity, suitable for delicate painting or large-scale extravagance, comfortable to use with the brush, rich changes, soft but not soft, hard but implicit, both upright and smooth, suitable for hooking, dotting, rubbing and rubbing.