Two Hallmarks, Two Connections

This article has been included in The Leadhead's Pencil Blog Volume 7, now available here.

If you don't want the book but you enjoy the article, please consider supporting the Blog project here.

This pair of very typical sterling pencils advance the pencil mechanism by twisting either the nose or the back half of the pencil:

The design is based on Mabie’s October 3, 1854 patent, but after that patent expired nearly all of the Victorian penmakers turned out pencils along these lines.  Many are unmarked, but one of these bears an example of a hallmark I had been looking for – a J within a diamond. On either side of the mark are the numbers 925 and 1000 a typically European designation of silver content, suggesting this one might have been made for export. 

The mark was not registered as a Federal trademark, but it was picked up in the 1904 edition of Trade-Marks of the Jewelry and Kindred Trades as a state-protected mark.  I included excerpts from the pen and pencil section as an appendix to American Writing Instrument Trademarks 1870-1953, and this mark appears on page 291:

While I was browsing around in the appendix of my own book, I found the answer concerning the other of these two pencils.  I’ve puzzled over this one far too long, so I’ll say it again . . . I need to read my own books more often.  The other pencil has the letter B in a similar diamond:

This one was also included in the 1904 edition of Trade-Marks of the Jewelry and Kindred Trades, so it is also included in American Writing Instrument Trademarks, in use by E. & J. Bass at 573 Broadway, New York.  

My trademark book also includes excerpts from the 1915 and 1922 editions of Trade-Marks of the Jewelry and Kindred Trades; the 1915 editions lists both marks as still in active use.  For 1922, both marks appear, but the Bass mark adds the notation “(Discontinued)” and the Johnson mark states “Out of Business.”

The similarity of the two pencils, the proximity of Bass to Johnson’s firm at the time (Johnson was at 178 Broadway), and the similarity of the two marks all suggest some connection between the two, but it looks like that relationship was a simple one between a supplier and a customer.  

E.& J. Bass was a partnership between Ephraim Bass (born 1865) and Jacob Bass (born 1872).  Most sources suggest their partnership was formed in 1895, and that is confirmed by New York City Directories; Trow’s 1894-1895 directory lists only Ephraim as a jeweler at 35 Maiden Lane, while the 1895-1896 directory lists both Ephraim and Jacob at that address, and a listing for E. &. J. Bass as well.

One source indicated that Jacob was working in Chicago in 1892, and he does appear in the 1892 Chicago directory, as a wholesale jeweler located at 151 State Street.  That same source indicated that in the 1893 Chicago directory, there’s an indication that Jacob was working for Ephraim - while I haven’t been able to confirm that fact, Jacob’s return to New York working alongside Ephraim just a couple years later suggests that the partnership might have existed informally sometime between 1893 and 1895.  

By 1900, the Bass firm had enough surplus inventory for a bulk sale to Mandel Brothers, a Chicago jewelry firm.  On December 2, 1900, The Chicago Tribune ran Mandel’s advertisement for E. & J. Bass inventory:

The advertisement includes a facsimile of the letter from Ephraim Bass confirming the terms of the sale; the letterhead indicates the firm was engaged in “Diamonds & Jewelry Importers of Novelties.”

One particularly helpful site, www.sterlingflatwarefashions.com, indicates that Ephraim left the firm in 1914, by which time the firm was trading under the name “Empire Art Silver,” as shown in this advertisement in the Louisville, Kentucky Courier News on June 1, 1910:

The firm continued on under Jacob’s leadership and under the same name.  On July 17, 1921, The New York Tribune reported that safecrackers were unsuccessful in looting the firm’s vaults on Broadway, where the “biggest supply [of silver] in the world is stored”:

Perhaps that “biggest supply” claim is true, and this firm I’d never heard of until now was bigger than Gorham, or Tiffany, or a host of other silversmiths that were smaller but inexplicably better known.  More likely is that the men behind E. & J. Bass were capitalizing on the event for a bit of free publicity – particularly since the firm had picked up a replacement for Ephraim who was prone to hyperbole: Harry Negbaur, the firm’s new vice president. 

Negbaur surfaces later in pencil history, although at the time I last wrote about him I didn’t have his first name. H. Negbaur & Company turns up in 1933 at 230 Broadway, the same address that in 1929 was occupied by Demley, Inc., makers of the Riedell Repeating Pencils (see Volume 3, page 44).  Demley was better known for its lines of cigarette lighters, and H. Negbaur & Company was the maker of the “Sure Fire” lighter pencil, among other lighter-related products, leading me to conclude that Negbaur might have been the successor to Demley. 

Maybe . . . although 230 Broadway is a big building in a big city.  It was fascinating to see another personality weaving in and out of another one of these stories  -- a river of pencils runs through it, to riff the title of an old movie.