Monday, November 7, 2016

An Interesting Waterman Overlay

This article has been edited and included in The Leadhead's Pencil Blog Volume 4; 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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I was approached by John Bineno at the Michigan Pen Show a few weeks ago.  He had some Waterman pens and pencils to show off:


All these are made using the same overlay pattern - Waterman’s official name for it was “Duchesse,” although some collectors had begun to refer to it as “Art Deco” before the documentation of the official name was discovered, and the name continues to stick.


The pattern was only used on the company’s smaller ringtop models - the 452 ½,V pen in Watermanese.  There’s a couple good sources online for the Waterman numbering codes: the 4 indicates a sterling overlay on the cap and barrel, the 5 indicates a lever filler, the 2 is the nib size, the ½ denominates a slender model and the V suffix denominates a vest pocket model.  These don’t turn up very often, and the initials on the cap led me straight to the online listing where the chained pair originated:


The pencils . . . they had a different numbering system entirely.  The 1925 catalog at the Pen Collectors of America’s online library lumps all of the small sterling ringtop pencils under the model number “421V w.r.”   The name of the overlay would then be added, so these are not 452 1/2V pencils . . . they are 421Vw.r. pencils in Duchesse:


Note that one of John’s pencils has a more sharply tapered tip, which I attribute to being slightly older, or at least introduced earlier – these are uncommon enough to suggest a fairly short run, so either older parts were continuing to be used up, or perhaps the nose is a replacement.  David Nishimura attributes the Duchesse to “later production,” so I think the longer nose is more likely correct.   At the top, note that each is slightly different:



Sunday, November 6, 2016

The Shot I Couldn't Wait To Take

This article has been edited and included in The Leadhead's Pencil Blog Volume 4; 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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When “the lights came one” recently and a couple friends provided me the valuable suggestions I needed to take better pictures, I could hardly wait to get behind the camera and take some good pictures.  There was one, in particular, that I wanted to take:


I’ve had this pencil for a couple of years now, marked “Doran Deliance / Prov. R.I. Pat Pend / Sterling Silver,” and I’ve tried to photograph it a dozen times or so.  I had no trouble with the full length shots, including this one showing the sterling example missing its clip as well as a gold filled version:


But something about the faintness of that imprint and the curvature of the barrel had detailed shots of the imprint out of my grasp.

The fact that I finally got a decent picture of the imprint on a Doran Deliance may be the biggest news I have for you about these right now, since I haven’t been able to learn anything about these yet . . . which is why this story is running on a lazy Sunday.  The only tangible lead was for a hit in my patent book for James A. Doran and Joseph D. Doran of Providence, Rhode Island, who applied for a patent for a screw drive pencil on October 19, 1921.  The patent was issued as number 1,521,802 on January 6, 1925:


However, I find no record of the Doran boys, a Doran company that had anything to do with writing instruments or anything called the “Deliance.”

Saturday, November 5, 2016

Ever Slight

This article has been edited and included in The Leadhead's Pencil Blog Volume 4; 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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This nifty little set caught my eye at the Raleigh Pen Show last June:


As the lid indicates, the set is a miniature Ever-Rite set.  The Ever-Rite brand is one I haven’t fully figured out yet, with it’s Sheafferesque and DeWitt-Lafrancelike features which had me thinking about the intricate connections between so many manufacturers that my head was left swimming (see http://leadheadpencils.blogspot.com/2014/10/the-evidence-continues-to-build.html):


But on this crisp fall Saturday, all I wanted to do was show you this neat little set.  The pencil is unmarked with an enamel barrel, but the pen is marked on the “band” of unpainted metal:


Friday, November 4, 2016

Don't Adjust Your Monitor

This article has been edited and included in The Leadhead's Pencil Blog Volume 4; 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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When this popped up in an online auction, I did several quadruple takes, trying to determine if it was an Eversharp and, if it was, whether it was . . . orange . . .


The ribbed clip and longer tip indicate post-1924 production, and when it arrived, a close look revealed something imprinted faintly on the side:


A light fill-in with a china marker and a wipe or two with a cloth, and all is revealed:


I’ve never seen an Eversharp with this imprint before, but I had seen this before:


Here’s the “Eversharp Utility Unit,” advertised near the end of Wahl Eversharp’s 1928 catalog (this page is from the Pen Collectors of America’s online reference library).    As for the color, I always thought the colors in the catalog weren’t quite right, but it does appear orange.   But looking more closely at the text:


“The Unit is made up of –
1 special enameled Eversharp . . . 6 tubes Eversharp Red Top Lead . . . “

Thursday, November 3, 2016

One Out of Three

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In August, I had another good run of luck hunting Parker Vacumatic pencils:


The top one caught my eye when it came up in an online auction for that slightly larger center band - similar to the earlier Deluxe Duofold models:


This one has a “26" date code, denoting second quarter of 1936:


The pencil, as I learned later, is the pencil matching the Vacumatic Senior pens – and I also learned that I had outbid a couple good friends in the process.  One of them has prevailed on me to sell it to him when I see him at the Ohio Show - he’s been working on completing a set of them, so he’ll let me photograph the other colors alongside this one as part of the deal.

The middle one comes from Daniel Kirchheimer, and he’s been teasing me with it for some time; he brought it with him to the DC show, and I was powerless to resist its charms. That unusual nose is an indicator of what you might know it is, yet think it can’t possibly be:


That LL stands for Liquid Lead.  This is the second example of these I’ve had the opportunity to handle – the other one was a burgundy example Jerry Kemp allowed me to photograph a while back (see http://leadheadpencils.blogspot.com/2014/11/probably-unless-it-isnt.html).  The Liquid Lead pencil was introduced by Parker in 1955, making an example in Vacumatic plastic really weird since it was last produced in Canada in 1953.

Alas, this one isn’t going to stay with me very long, either.  Joe Nemecek scored another example of the Kaligraf (Snapfil) pencil with a side clip at the DC show – the one with the green cap in this picture.


Damn, I don’t know how I missed that one – but at least this meant his duplicate was vulnerable for a trade.  Joe is more rabid in his pursuit of all things Parker than I am, and I’ve been waiting for a side clip Snapfil for a long, long time. . . so, at the Ohio show next month, this one is also slipping through my fingers.

The last one of the three is something I found at the DC Show, and it needs no introduction:


This one sports a “37" date code - for the third quarter of 1937.


It also sports an owner who says this one is off limits!

Wednesday, November 2, 2016

Why a Bird in the Hand Is Better

This article has been edited and included in The Leadhead's Pencil Blog Volume 4; 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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I’ve had a couple of opportunities to handle and photograph Sheaffer Balance-era double ended pencils over the years - Pat Mohan and Mike Kirk were both very generous with their time in allowing me to photograph them (see 
http://leadheadpencils.blogspot.com/2015/01/at-other-end-of-sheaffer-lovers-club.html and http://leadheadpencils.blogspot.com/2014/10/the-middle-part-is-best.html).  Don’t get me wrong, but there’s a reason I’d rather have one back at Pencil Central for some serious comparing to other things in the museum - in a vacuum, photographed by themselves at shows, I wasn’t able to really tear things apart and see what makes them tick, and whether and how they tick differently than other things.

At this year’s Michigan Show, I jumped at the chance to pick this one up from Dan Reppert, partly because I couldn’t wait for the opportunity to spend some real quality time with one of these, and partly because . . . ok, I’ll admit it – because I really really frickin’ wanted one:



Mine sports blue and red bands – different from Mike’s and Pat’s, and especially nice for me since it matches my Craig double-ender:


Disassembled, I found that the Craig’s trim rings were held in place solely by virtue of being sandwiched between the pencil barrels and the center band; the Sheaffer bands were much better secured. Note also that the threads on the Sheaffer are less aggressive, although they are about the same gauge:


The example I picked up from Dan had the same diamond-shaped facets, different from the simple round Craig band:


But what I was most interested to see was how the Sheaffer double-ender compares with similar Sheaffer parts.  I compared it with a Sheaffer golf pencil and an oversized Balance pencil:


I had previously noted how the double-ender couldn’t have been made from two lower halves of golf pencils, simply joined by a plastic band: the imprints are on the barrels of the double-ender, while they are found on the caps of golf pencils.  Besides, the barrels were longer on the double-enders.  What this picture shows is that in addition to those differences, the threads on a golf pencil are much finer than what you’ll find on a double ender.  And a side-by-side comparison to the oversized Balance pencil at the top of this picture shows that the tip and the diameter are nowhere near as large as what you’ll find on a double-ender.

For whatever reason, Sheaffer put together these double-ended pencil from unique parts specially made for the occasion.

Tuesday, November 1, 2016

Then What About This One?

This article has been edited and included in The Leadhead's Pencil Blog Volume 4; 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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When Harry P. Fairchild and Ephraim S. Johnson, Jr. ended the partnership known as Fairchild & Johnson in 1905, the firm was renamed Fairchild & Co. and the J was dropped from the F/J shield hallmark. 


In my experience, these last Fairchilds are the hardest to find - according to David Nishimura’s article, the company limped along until 1927, but was not nearly as prolific as it had been in previous incarnations.

When I did finally find an example, I noted a couple things:


First, I was surprised how small the pencil was when it arrived – only four inches or so long.  I was expecting something larger, since it looks and operates so much like one of the Hicks/Edward Todd/Cartier/Louis Tamis family of nose-drive pencils.  William S. Hicks was the patentee for the design, which was issued in 1918.  This Fairchild bears no indication of a patent or a patent application pending – but then again, neither do most of these, including this Edward Todd:


In fact, take a closer look a the clip on that Fairchild.  I wonder if the clip was the inspiration for, or was inspired by, Edward Todd’s take on the upturned clip . . .


In the meantime, another example of this pencil surfaced in the hands of Brian McQueen, who sent it to me for a family picture: