(fountain pen set Mr Pottersblog is auctioning off)
Ebay is a lot of fun as you all probably know. Here is a little story.
20 some years ago my wife borrowed some pens from her family's desk and had them repaired. They were old fountain pens and with repair, magnificent. She met Sam Himoto of Chicago's Universal Pen Hospital. Sam became a good friend of both of us and we learned a bit about pens, especially pre-40s Sheaffer and Parker fountain pens. They are very delicate, and the parts dry out over time, but people began collecting and repairing them in the 90s, and now we have ebay. The wife has dozens of old but working pens, and I have a 15-20. My handwriting is awful, but they are great to draw with.
Here is another story. My father gave me a pocket watch when I was a kid, which my great-grandmother told me had been her great-uncle Edgar's, an Elgin railroad watch from just after the Civil War. I had it repaired and it works perfectly, then one day in '94 I saw another old Elgin for 3 bucks and......OK, now I have a few more. I only like Elgins, big solid AMERCAN made watches, easy to repair, and work beautifully. They are not delicate like fountain pens. A person can easily spend hundreds on an Elgin pocket watch, and hundreds more on a repair, and although 3 dollar antique watches are rare, I found another Elgin watch for 3 bucks last summer...oh my, the thrill of the hunt!
So, between you and me, this nice little set here is one we are not attached to, and so we thought we would sell it, so we have spending money for MORE pens and watches...
1 comment:
Very nice, Gary. I learned to use a fountain pen in the sixth grade. We had a very old-school teacher who believed so firmly in them value of penmanship that he bought every one of his students a decent Platignum pen. It didn't help my writing much, but I bought myself a new Cross pen a few years ago and have been working on my writing skills since.
Post a Comment