In the Company of Fine Snails

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As Joe Nemecek and I went through the large collection of Victorian pencils Ed Fingerman brought to show us at the DC show, it quickly became apparent that I was going to have to prioritize.  Even limiting myself to American pieces only didn’t pare down what he was offering sufficiently for me to be able to afford them all; after I had assembled my little pile, I found myself playing a mini-game of “pencil survivor,” making difficult choices about which ones to vote off the island.

When it came to these three, they are all along the same lines . . . but in the end, I simply couldn’t bear to put any of them back:

I’ve heard these referred to as “desk pencils,” not because they fit into a socket or stand but because they are full length and they don’t telescope – best for sitting on a desk rather than protruding from one’s pocket.  All three are sterling, and all three have an exquisitely wrought “snail” pattern.

And if you know what subtle dfferences to look for, you know who made two out of three of them without even having to reach for a loupe to find the hallmarks.

The top example has that great middle section you’ve seen here before, most recently on a gold-filled “Hutch Clutch” pencil (see “The Mabie Todd-Hutcheon Connection” at https://leadheadpencils.blogspot.com/2017/07/the-mabie-todd-hutcheon-connection.html), which I compared to a very similar desk pencil marked Mabie Todd.  In fact, this new addition is a nice complement to the desk pencil from that last article:

And both examples have a hallmark used by Mabie Todd, an M within a square (see “M Is for Mabie” at https://leadheadpencils.blogspot.com/2016/12/m-is-for-mabie.html).

Now let’s have a look at the bottom example from that first picture.  Notice that ring of beads at the top end and near the nose?

After you’ve studied these things for awhile, you’d immediately suspect Hicks . . . and lo and behold . . .

There’s the Hicks acorn hallmark, at the right end.  I’ve got a theory – an unsubstantiated theory – that Hicks marked pencils made for its own account with the name “Hicks” or “W.S. Hicks,” but when the firm made pencils for sale by others, they were marked with an X and the acorn.  Maybe the theory isn’t entirely unsubstantiated . . . have a look at a very similar pencil marked with the name of the jewelry firm Black, Starr & Frost and the Hicks acorn in “Welcome to the Family” (https://leadheadpencils.blogspot.com/2015/02/welcome-to-family.html).

And then there’s that middle example from that first shot.  Well, maybe I exaggerated a bit at the beginning of this article – two out of three of these pencils I could see what they were from a blue mile away, but on this third one the center cartouche is the only thing that’s distinctive (other than the incredibly artistry):

So yes . . . I had to break down and pull out my loupe to see what was going on.  The answer was indeed there on the nosecone:

A shield with an F and a J . . . for Fairchild Johnson.  The errant F next to the shield appears to be a double stamp (note that you can also see traces of the diagonal line within the shield).