An Entirely New Take on the Riedell

Here’s a pair of pencils that turned up at the Ohio Show last November: 

When I find one Riedell at a show, it’s been a great show. When I find two, it’s been twice as great. The green ringtop is an example I’ve admired for years, in the collection of the late Frank Tedesco; I became its successor custodian during the Saturday night auction. The full-sized red in a dealer’s junk box just an hour or so before the end of the show on Sunday – while I wonder how many times I walked right by it over the course of a four-day weekend, I can assure you that I didn’t walk right by it that last time!

The Riedell is one of those brands I’ve always bought no matter how many I’ve got at home - all in the hopes that if I examine them closely enough, I’ll find something imprinted on it to let me know something about their history. Alas . . . no matter how closely I looked, all I could find on these was the same markings I always see:

"Riedell Corp. NY Pat Pend’g." Oh well, I thought . . . at least these two help fill out the family a bit, and it was great to have Frank’s ringtop in the group:

Fortunately, this story does not end here. As I reviewed writing instrument patents one by one in the course of researching American Writing Instrument Patents Volume 2: 1911-1945, I ran across this one, for a repeating pencil that operated, just like the Riedell, by twisting and releasing the nose cone . . .

To learn more, this full article is included in The Leadhead's Pencil Blog Volume 3, available at Amazon, Barnes & Noble and everywhere else you buy books, or you can order a copy signed by yours truly through the Legendary Lead Company HERE.