Factory Errors

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.

Yesterday’s article reminded me to show you an EVRDA that I like for all the wrong reasons:

The EVRDA, like the early metal Century pencils, were made by the Blake Pencil Company.  C.E. Barrett & Co. supplied pencils to Century, but marketed “EVRDA” pencils on its own account through another Barrett company, the Chicago Safety Pen Company (see Volume 6, page 175).  I bought this example because I had ringtop examples in silver plate and gold fill, and this one was listed as being in sterling:

However, when the sterling example arrived, there was something amiss.  All the examples I had on hand – not just the ringtops, but the side clip examples too – had imprints which were neatly centered:

This sterling example, however, has lettering which is staggered – “EVRDA” is nowhere near centered over “Sterling / Pat. Applied For.”  There’s more, too . . . on the barrel, underneath the cap, there’s a duplicate imprint: the “Pat. Applied For” is clearly visible, and to the left of it you can see the very bottom of the “EVRDA” name.  Underneath the D in “Applied,” there’s a weird star-shaped indentation:

The star doesn’t appear on any of my other EVRDA pencils, or on the Century-marked ones, either.  Factory error?  Closeout model made from leftover parts?  I’m not sure there’s any way to know.  

If factory errors on pens and pencils attracted the sort of interest as double-die coins do in the numismatist’s world, I’d be even more excited about the EVRDA – and doubly so about this next one:

This is a Mabie Todd “Fyne Poynt” pencil.  I bought it for the nice engraving, and when it arrived I was surprised by the weight of it, even though it isn’t marked 14k.  The cap, which might be a replacement, proved to be the most interesting thing about it.  Instead of the typical “Fyne Poynt” imprint on one side of the cap, this one has that imprint twice, once on each side of the cap:

That’s no variation; this one is clearly a factory error – a double die, as the coin guys might say:

The two imprints actually overlap.