What is your latest pen acquisition?

[Sailor Kenshin]

My first Maki-e: Platinum Preppy Wa Modern Waki-e Fukura Suzume LE. $11 at Goulet 🤣

Don't tempt me. 😉

[christof]

my latest acqusition is a....Parker Wood pen from 1980.

[VertOlive]

My first Maki-e: Platinum Preppy Wa Modern Waki-e Fukura Suzume LE. $11 at Goulet 🤣

Don't tempt me. 😉

Sorry….but they are lovely little plastic maki-e jelly beans, with an inoffensive and smooth nib. I’ll probably need a couple more!

[Blue Note]

my latest acqusition is a....Parker Wood pen from 1980.

That's a new one on me. Very interesting and very pretty. Good find.

[Jon Szanto]

my latest acqusition is a....Parker Wood pen from 1980.

Oh, great - a pen that can get termites!

[Jon Szanto]

The latest acquisitions - to be on the premises - are two Sheaffer WASP pens from the 1930s. I picked up a pen/pencil set, in what is commonly called "circuit board" celluloid, last August at the PCA Auction at the SF pen show. Not a pen I had chased, it was for a good cause, but it got my curiosity when I had them, even while they were the junior size.

So I kept my eye out and at the turn of the year I landed two different pens in silver pearl (the actual catalog name), one a Standard and the other their biggest, the Large (which has an eye-catching jeweler's band). I took them to the LA pen show and handed off to a friend who is an expert Sheaffer plunger restoration guy. I just got them back a couple of days ago and... wow. Here are a couple of pics he took for me, and also an in-progress, in-barrel photo showing the great work he does cleaning up to attain maximum transparency. Very pleased for this micro-mini collection of WASPs that seems to be occurring. (Careful observers may have a question on one small detail...)

[MarcoA64]

I bought a Jinhao X159 orange, it skipped a lot at the beginning. When I washed it before using it, blue ink residue came out, maybe they tested it? Anyway, I flushed the previous ink fill, gave it a second wash and filled it with Aurora Black. The skipping has slowly stopped. It is similar, in size, to my MB 149
I also got a Parker 75 Sterling Silver Cisele, nice little pen and a good writer.

[Scrawler]

I bought a Jinhao X159 orange, it skipped a lot at the beginning. When I washed it before using it, blue ink residue came out, maybe they tested it? Anyway, I flushed the previous ink fill, gave it a second wash and filled it with Aurora Black. The skipping has slowly stopped. It is similar, in size, to my MB 149
I also got a Parker 75 Sterling Silver Cisele, nice little pen and a good writer.

I have tested several X159 recently and every one had been dip tested with blue ink. The first thing to do with this pen is to flush it thoroughly before filling first time.

[fountainpenkid]

838C94FE-5E97-405E-BAEB-E885CF40D493.jpeg
This is not a Vacumatic. The celluloid is actually far more interesting in its irregularity and thr base color of transparent blue (a bit like a “Ripley” Vac). The nib reminds me of a very flexible Waterman’s somehow—nothing like the feel of a contemporary OMAS.
62DF3F9A-281D-4B9D-BF56-DEA13D710C1E.jpeg

[FredRydr]

my latest acqusition is a....Parker Wood pen from 1980.

Fill it with:

[Jon Szanto]

I have a thing for oddball, clownish pens, and one of the great repositories is the plethora of 3rd-tier pen companies from the Golden Era of the 30s-40s Wild and wacky celluloids ruled, and I snap them up on a whim, like this one

So I got the below pen, a true "no-name" and it got to me 3 days ago. Yesterday, my artist pal, Jeff B, posted an oil he did in 2008 titled "She Dreams of Chaparral Shoes" and it floored me how similar the vibes and palettes were. I had to commemorate the serendipity, but the only way was truly quick-and-dirty: the pen is hovering over the artwork, which is being displayed on my iPad - not an easy shot. Enjoy the riot of color, and go check out the wonderwork of Jeffrey Beauchamp (on Instagram as @jeffreybeauchampart).

[Dougc]

Very cool.

Sent from my SM-G781V using Tapatalk

[Jon Szanto]

This is not a Vacumatic.

Boy, I'll say - what a magnificent specimen! Before I realized it was one of the Italians, I almost thought that was a Valentine-type nib from the Newhaven (UK) factory. I love it, thank you for sharing.

[fountainpenkid]

This is not a Vacumatic.

Boy, I'll say - what a magnificent specimen! Before I realized it was one of the Italians, I almost thought that was a Valentine-type nib from the Newhaven (UK) factory. I love it, thank you for sharing.

Ah I hadn't thought of that! I remembered Valentines for their wavy celluloid but forgot some share the long "scooped out" tines of this Williamson. It is quite a look, and one of the many ways to achieve (or probably more accurately, enhance?) flexibility.

[fountainpenkid]

I have a thing for oddball, clownish pens, and one of the great repositories is the plethora of 3rd-tier pen companies from the Golden Era of the 30s-40s Wild and wacky celluloids ruled, and I snap them up on a whim, like this one

So I got the below pen, a true "no-name" and it got to me 3 days ago. Yesterday, my artist pal, Jeff B, posted an oil he did in 2008 titled "She Dreams of Chaparral Shoes" and it floored me how similar the vibes and palettes were. I had to commemorate the serendipity, but the only way was truly quick-and-dirty: the pen is hovering over the artwork, which is being displayed on my iPad - not an easy shot. Enjoy the riot of color, and go check out the wonderwork of Jeffrey Beauchamp (on Instagram as @jeffreybeauchampart).

Wow! I've never seen anything from that era with such an range of colors and patterns--even more of a range than the OMAS clown pen (at least the modern version). Have you?

[Jon Szanto]

Ah I hadn't thought of that! I remembered Valentines for their wavy celluloid but forgot some share the long "scooped out" tines of this Williamson. It is quite a look, and one of the many ways to achieve (or probably more accurately, enhance?) flexibility.

It reminded me of this pen's nib, which I found last year:

[FredRydr]

... Enjoy the riot of color, and go check out ....

Its bright colors have survived amazingly. What is it made of?

[Jon Szanto]

Wow! I've never seen anything from that era with such an range of colors and patterns--even more of a range than the OMAS clown pen (at least the modern version). Have you?

Yeah, this caught my eye, even with two other pens vying for attention. I think there were probably a lot of these crazies at the time, as evidence below from another I got last year, paired with a contemporary Leonardo in one of Jon Brooke's materials. There are the stories about all the leftover pieces, put down on a slab and melted at the end of the week to make new sheets (you can see on the barrel of today's post where the spiral wrapping shows). There was a fine collector, Dan DeMaio, who had a lot of variants on the off-beat pens of that era; sadly, he passed away last year.

[Jon Szanto]

... Enjoy the riot of color, and go check out ....

Its bright colors have survived amazingly. What is it made of?

Fred, your guess is as good as mine. I have a very, very, very hard time delineating the various terms/materials from the era. I never know for sure if it is celluloid or what, and I've never gotten good answers as to how to tell. I can say that there are quite a few different pieces in this amalgam of plastics - are they even all the same?

Honestly, this is an area I would love to research.

[fountainpenkid]

... Enjoy the riot of color, and go check out ....

Its bright colors have survived amazingly. What is it made of?

Fred, your guess is as good as mine. I have a very, very, very hard time delineating the various terms/materials from the era. I never know for sure if it is celluloid or what, and I've never gotten good answers as to how to tell. I can say that there are quite a few different pieces in this amalgam of plastics - are they even all the same?

Honestly, this is an area I would love to research.

I wonder who bought them.