I use a nice fountain pen. I have since about 1990. Carry one with me every day. Most people don't notice, for the most part. I actually have a few different pens that I love and have purchased over the years. These pens use replaceable plastic cartridges filled with ink, but I don't do that because that's a waste of money. Being a Connecticut Yankee and wanting to save money, I refill one cartridge over and over from a bottle of ink using a syringe. I save a fortune this way! And maybe once a month I take each of my fountain pens apart and wash the nib and the feed part of the pen under warm water in the kitchen sink, to clean them and to keep the ink flowing after I have refilled them. And sometimes, I get ink on me. That's actually a badge of honor that fellow fountain pen lovers will notice right away!
6 comments:
This made me smile being a Connecticut Yankee, but how long will it take to get the ink off of your fingers?
Joan
I will stick with my plastic cartridges for my fountain pen :-) Betsey
Your blog post today got me to thinking about Ball Point Pens and when the Ball Point Pen was Invented?
John J. Loud obtained what is technically the first patent for a ballpoint pen, US #392,046, on 30th October 1888.
Although a patent was issued in 1888, it was until the early to mid 1950's that Bic and Paper Mate ball point pens were produced and sold in large quantities.
Primo, thanks so much for the history of the ball point pen. The ball point pen, of course might be quite practical, but there is no elegance at all in writing with one! Even if it is a really expensive Cross ball point!
According to Qadi al-Nu'man al-Tamimi (d. 974) in his Kitab al-Majalis wa 'l-musayarat, the Fatimid caliph Al-Mu'izz li-Din Allah in Arab Egypt demanded a pen that would not stain his hands or clothes, and was provided with a pen that held ink in a reservoir, allowing it to be held upside-down without leaking.
There is compelling evidence that a working fountain pen was constructed and used during the Renaissance by artist and inventor Leonardo da Vinci. Leonardo's journals contain drawings with cross-sections of what appears to be a reservoir pen that works by both gravity and capillary action. The fountain pen was available in Europe in the 17th century and is shown by contemporary references. M. Klein and Henry W. Wynne received U.S. patent 68,445 in 1867 for an ink chamber and delivery system in the handle of the fountain pen. As fountain pen people love to say, "It's not what you write, but what you write with!"
Wow! All this information about pens from Ken Schwarz and you. Now, I feel like I should look into a fountain with a refillable ink cartridge when I think of all of the plastic ball point pens going into the landfills.
Joan
Joan: GREAT comment! I never thought about the waste that is created when used pens are discarded! Brilliant observation! I never intentionally throw out one of my fountain pens! Sad to say, I have lost two fountain pens, one while hiking in New Mexico, and one 40 years earlier, going through airport security in San Francisco on the way to Australia. That pen was my first, and I was heartbroken to lose it.
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