Pens and Paper

What a find -- a cool pen from the past!

I have old cars, so I went to what's believed to be the world's largest antique-auto flea market, in Hershey, Pennsylvania. And what did I buy? A pen!

In addition to car items, vendors often have a few unrelated items on their tables. One fellow had a glass pen that was marked as a souvenir of an 1895 fair. It was neat, but I didn't really want it badly enough for the price he was asking. (I did, however, clear up his misconception that it was a letter opener.)

I moved to his other table, and spied this. "How much?" I asked. "That's the dollar table," he said. And so I gave him a buck.

When I got back to my hotel room, I turned on my computer and started searching for information on it. I hadn't been trying to take advantage of him, because I genuinely didn't know what it was. (I went back to his aisle the next day to give him some extra money for it, but he'd already packed up and left.)

The imprint reads, "Laughlin. Detroit. Mich." According to Richard Binder, Laughlin was a higher-end company that opened in 1896 and sold its assets to Carter's Ink around 1926, although its founder still made pens up until 1943. This one's an eyedropper, so it's older than 1912.

It's hard rubber, and while it had dried ink in it and obviously has been used, its chasing and imprint are as sharp as the day it was made. Some online fountain pen folks told me how to clean and fill it. I thought the smooth cap was from something else, but it turns out it's original to the pen.

Cleaned up and filled, it writes beautifully, with a lovely flex nib that's very smooth. I don't often buy fountain pens at flea markets, other than cartridge pens, because I'm not familiar with repairing them, and I find most of them will cost more to fix than they're worth. I bought this one because it was beautiful, and if it didn't write, it would still be a great display pen for a dollar. Sometimes you really do find treasures.

 

Carter's Nib: Pen or showpiece?

Here's a cute little item I picked up recently in a flea market in New York.

It's a Carter's nib in a plastic holder, and the whole thing is 3.5 inches long. Carter's was a very old brand, dating to 1858 and located in Massachusetts. It made pens until 1932 and then concentrated on making ink.

The plastic barrel reads "Carter's" and "Made in U.S.A.," and the number 11. The nib reads "Signature 6 Made in USA."

I thought it was a salesman's sample, but I've since seen several on the Internet advertised as short dip pens, or as signature pens ... perhaps something you kept on your desk for people to sign items when they didn't have a pen of their own.

Whatever it is, at $8.00, I couldn't leave it behind. It's never had ink on it, but the barrel is rather cheaply made, and the flashing hasn't been polished off.

What's up with pen prices?

I spent the day at an antiques market, much of which involved lots of little items: china, toys, and knick knacks. Of course, whenever I'm in any "old stuff" setting, I'm on the lookout for pens.

I found them, but of course they were the type that are all-too-familiar at these shows: pretty much worthless. Not one of them looked like it could easily be salvaged. Most had bent or broken nibs, lever fills that wouldn't move, or were missing their clips. One Sheaffer had a barrel marked Made in Canada, while its cap was marked Made in USA, but it was being marketed as an original pen.

And as is usually the case, most were outrageously overpriced. The highest was a Waterman Lady Patrician, encrusted with old ink and a lever that wouldn't budge, marked at $285. A Sheaffer with the tip of its nib snapped off was $65. Even crusty dip pens, their stained nibs stuffed into badly-chewed wooden handles, were $10 each.

What's up with this? Are people actually paying these prices, thinking they've purchased something wonderful, old, and valuable? And are these vendors out to fleece, or do they honestly believe that a pen that will never write again is somehow worth as much as one that does? Whatever it is, I'm tired of spotting pens at general antique shows, checking the high price tag, and then unscrewing the cap to discover a pen that looks like it's been in a war zone. Enough is enough already.