Friday, February 10, 2017

Carter's and DeWitt-LaFrance: An Important Missing Link

This article has been edited and included in The Leadhead's Pencil Blog Volume 5; copies are available print on demand through Amazon here, and I offer an ebook version in pdf format at the Legendary Lead Company here.

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Recently I posted an article about an announcement I found in a 1925 issue of Office Appliances that Carter’s Ink Company had purchased DeWitt-LaFrance (http://leadheadpencils.blogspot.com/2016/12/my-christmas-gift-to-you.html), settling a longstanding argument concerning what became of DeWitt-LaFrance.

This find is equally convincing:


Dents and all, this little ringtop fills in a very important gap in the historical record.  We have the 1925 announcement in Office Appliances, and back in 2009 “Ordo ab Chao” posted this instruction sheet on Fountain Pen Network:


This indicates that the Superite pencil – DeWitt-LaFrance’s flagship line – was “Manufactured by The Carter’s Ink Co.”  Ordo indicated the instruction sheet accompanied a boxed pen and pencil set marked only “Superite.”  But did Carter’s actually own the brand?


This is the only example I have ever seen marked both “Carter’s” and “Superite.”

1 comment:

Jan said...

Hi! Thanks for posting! I have one of these Superites marked "DeWitt La France Co." patent pending. It helps to have the instructions!