So instead of talking about someone else's history of FP's, let's talk about yours. What's your first memory of an FP.

When I was 6 or so, we lived with my grandparents in the house they'd lived in since the early 20's. What a great place with nooks and cranny's to explore. Anyway, when I was bored I used to be in the habit of rummaging around my granpa's desk, which was packed with cool stuff, most of which he would probably find rather ordinary.

In that desk I can remember finding a fountain pen, green plastic with a silver cap. Cheap cartridge pen, maybe a parker or sheaffer. I can remember pulling off the cap and wondering how the heck that worked. Wrote with it some, took it apart. He had several spare cartridges in the desk as well.

That would have been around 1974. Never touched another fountain pen until 2000.

Wow, this is really dredging deep memory.

I recall as a child that my father wrote with a red (maroon?? or reddish hued) Waterman fountain pen using black ink. I think the ink color was required by his work.

I don't recall what pen my mother used at the time, but I do recall that she used either blue or blue-black ink.

Fast forward a few years to grade school where as a student we were required to use fountain pens. I recall that they were all Esterbrooks and that we had to use Sheaffer Washable Blue Ink. I believe the one I used was green striped.

When I got to High School, I was given a Parker 51 Areo with matching pencil. I'm still using them.

After College, I was given a Parker 75 and matching BP. Once again, I still have and use them.

About ten years ago, I started accumulating more fountain pens, mostly modern, mostly (relatively) inexpensive, all of which are in use.

No, I don't recall what happened to my father's Waterman or to the Esterbrooks that I used in grade school. Wish I did....

The 3 vintage pens I have from family are all very sentimental. My mother's High School esterbrook grey SJ, my grandfathers black SJ, and my grandmothers Diamond Medal celluloid from the 30's. Don't remember ever seeing those when I was a kid.

Hard question. The Fountain Pens I remember as far as I can pick at my memory are Reynolds plastic pen, with an octogonal white barrel and cap, and colored section. Those were fun. After that the Reynolds stainless. That all goes back to first grade, so that would be around 1980.

I remember, wanting a Waterman, which were a little more expensive than the Reynolds. I got one somewhere during primary school, and sticked to Watermans until highschool graduation, in 1992, when I received a Duofold Int. in blue marble.

After that it was quiet for 11 years... just me and my Duofold, until I moved here and a little voice screamed in my head : "Where do they hide their fountain pens here ?????" , leading to web searches... and you can guess the rest

Wow, this is a tough question....

I can't remember how old I was, but my first FP memory was probably my Mom or Dad's Kaweco piston-fillers (made in the late 1950's/very early 1960's). The pens were both black with gold trim, and Dad had an "Elite" model, while Mom had the "Dia" model. I believe they used them at work and/or university, so the pens were carried in separate small black leather pen cases that held up to two pens inside. My Mom kept a tiny photo of my Dad in her case In case you think this has a sad ending...it doesn't! My parents are alive and well (touch wood!) and Mom gave me her Kaweco about two years ago. Dad still uses his for personal correspondance.

I am pretty sure those two Kawecos are my first FP memory because I remember being inspired enough by my parents' FP ownership to buy myself a fountain pen! That pen was the red Sheaffers"No Nonsense" FP I talked about in this FPN thread.

Wow, first memory, well, let's see.... I think it was 1994 and I just got my first job fter college. I had moved to this picturesque little (and I do mean little!) town in upstate NY that had one grocery store, one gas station, one single screen movie theatre and about three antique stores. That first pen was a red bandles Venus Autograph, striped like a balance. Very pretty pen which I still have today. One tine was partly bent, and after a day or two it broke off. The pen went in a bag in my desk drawer for a few years until My wife introduced me to the internet.

ebay was shortly thereafter and a red LJ esterbrook with a 1551 nib came my way. smooth as silk it was, and in working order. Shortly thereafter a friend saw me using it and asked I get one for her in green. I did, only to realize esterrook came in different sizes as well as colors. The rest, as they say, is history.

Best-
Brian

When I was growing up my step-father had a keepsake box full of many interesting things and among those things there were some fountain pens that had belonged to his father.

I was only allowed to look at these and am in the process of tracking down the box which was given to my step-brother after my step father's passing.

I grew up in a small town where there was one stationary store which just happend to be right next to the 5 cent to a dollar store... these were two of my favourite places when I was just a wee lad and the other was the movie theatre where 25 cents got you into a matinee and another 25 cents would cover all the snacks one could handle.

After spending some of my allowance in the dollar store I would always stop at the stationary and go to the back counter where they kept all the beautiful pens in the elegant red / burgundy boxes.

I could gaze upon these for hours and do recall I was often there at closing time at which point, the owner would always tell me I could come back another day.

When I was 17 I was already pretty involved in a number of artistic endeavours, was writing to my grandmother regularly, and really loved cartooning so went on the hunt for a pen that would fill these needs.

Not having a lot of money, I selected a Parker Vector in stainless which cost me something like 20.00 Canadian.

I still have that pen and wrote a fairly copious amount of notes with it this evening at work.

I have now lost track of how many pens I actually have (number -wise).

Follow up :

I was browsing EBay and saw that auction : 6503703793 . This pen is very similar, if not the exact model I used during my highschool years. Not sure they still make that model, but speak of a workhorse !

I also found the online catalog of Reynolds pens : http://www.reynolds.fr/fra/catalogu/fa_stypl.htm
Those are cheap cheap cheap school pens (few USD), but work remarkably well. A lot of memories

Also, Stypen, manufacturer of many school pen brands. They became big when I entered highschool, and marketed pens carrying very popular brands among teenagers : http://www.stypen.fr/eng/catalogtrad.html


Hey... may be I should start distributing those cheap school pens in North America

My first recollection of a proper fountain pen is a yellow Pelikano with metal brushed cap, cartridge filler, and a blue ink window.

I remember using this thing through the last years at primary school, at age 11, going on 12.

Before that time, and also during de last year at primary school, we practiced cursive roundhand, a Dutch version from age 6 onwards, right up to the fifth grade, at age 10/11, all with dip pens, and ink pots built into the desk.

A few month ago, I bought a dip pen very similar to the one we used at the time, including some of the same scratchy dip nibs we used at school .

In the last grade it was fountain pen only, for me at least, the Pelikano I mentioned.

In high school I went through quite a few (cheap) fountain pens, but I loved my piston fillers best. and the first "expensive" fountain pen I ever bought was a Parker 25, it must have been 1973, maybe '74. That one I still own, and I won't part with it, sentimental value: I wrote my first love letters with it, to the lady who still calls herself my partner .

Ah well, those were the days

Kind regards, Wim

This is maddening to me because I can't remember the brand name of the cheap cartridge fountain pens I used to buy in the mid 70's for school and journalling. I do remember that I'd always buy "Peacock Blue" ink for them. Parker, Sheaffer? Something that would have been around $5. I don't remember anyone else ever using a fountain pen in school. Guess I've always been a bit eccentric.

Later in life, when I frequented antique shows, I would always see the nice expensive pens, $300-$600. I only knew I was drawn to them, but didn't dare even pick one up to look at it at those prices. That was about 15 years ago.

Leslie -

If you were using Peacock blue then you were buying Sheaffer pens.

Cheers!

Keith

My first memory of a fountain pen was going to the store with my mother to pick out a school pen. I chose a red schaeffer school pen (clear plastic).... I do remember the nuns having different pens than mine because you couldn't see the metal (I didn't know you called it a nib, etc)... I assume looking back they had hooded nibs... maybe a parker 51 of some sort....

My dad bought me my first fountain pen when I was 11 back in 1960.

I can't remember what make it was -- a Conway Stewart perhaps, but that's maybe just wishful thinking. It had a screw cap and was a lever filler. It was basically white with light blue marbling and the cap, section and barrell were all the same colour if I remember correctly.

I didn't have it very long before I "lost" it. I always suspected it was stolen by a jealous fellow pupil. Dad replaced it with something unmemorable, but my next memorable pen was a Parker stainless steel model bought as a present by my dad when I started work in 1965.

I've never seen any pictures of any pen that comes close to the white/light blue marbling that I remember. If anyone is able to identify the make from my brief description (and point me in the right direction for a photo), I would be delighted to hear from them.

Lessee....

Age 10 or 11 poking through a desk in my Aunt Mattie and Uncle Ed's place, finding a green fountain pen of some sort and having to put it back.

Age 12--14 buying Sheaffer school pens as gifts and buying and using a No Nonsense pen for the balance of my high school years.

Age 19 buying a Platignum calligraphy set

Age 23 buying my sister a gold Cross fountain pen as a graduation gift

William

My mom's burgundy Sheaffer snorkel. Not only did the pen have that cool mechanism, but the bottles of ink had a little side-pocket reservoir so you could easily fill your pen even if the ink in the bottle were low. You just tipped the bottle to fill the side-pocket before you opened the bottle. "You can tell it's a Sheaffer because of this white dot," mom said. I was going to get one when I got old enough.

What a great user interface!

Doug

Hi,

I saw a burgundy Platinum in Mom's pen cup.

Dillon

When I was growing up (age 7 or so) my parents would leave a pencil box full of pens next to the phone along with some paper to write down notes. Over time the pens dried up but no one threw them away or added fresh ones.

For some reason, one of the pens was a fountain pen that hand't been inked in years.

I remember on more then one occaision searching for a pen that would write while taking a phone message (there were about 5 or 6 ballpoints, all dead) and in desperation trying the fountain pen, knowing full well it wouldn't work. It never did.

There is an old Vietnamese tradition that on a baby's first birthday, he/she chooses an object from a platter. That object is supposed to indicate what profession he/she would most likely choose later in life.

So, my first FP, at one year of age, was my grandpa's Parker 45. He was, of course, delighted to have so effortlessly made a convert. Fast forward 17 years, and sure enough, I have become an addict. These old customs are never wrong.

thn, Korea has the same tradition --- probably China as well, belike that's where its origin lies.

William

My first memory of a FP was not so fond. When I was in college I saw and bought a cheap fountain pen at the local office supply store. I thought it looked really cool. Got the pen home, put in the cartridge, touched the nib to a piece of paper and ink went everywhere. Tried a few times to use it, always witht the same result. Threw the pen away and for the next 30 years thought FPs where pieces of junk. That opinion changed about 6 months ago when I tried FPs again. Now, I love them and will hardly use anything else.

Before using a fountain pen for the first time earlier this year, the only places I'v seen fountain pens is in movies or at a department store that had them for sale with huge price tags

First grade.... we had to use FP's. I used and always thought they were the cool pens, the Sheaffer school pens you could buy in a drug store. It was clear red cellophane look, that took cartridges.

Wow, great topic. My father graduated with his BA in 1953 and bought a Sheaffer snorkel. He used it until his death in 1986. I hardly ever remember it not being in his pocket as he wouldn't use anything else. I have that pen to this day and will never rebuild it, though it badly needs it. On occasion I uncap it and smell the dried ink (always Sheaffer Blue). Its amazing how certain smells will bring back such vivid childhood memories.

PeteWK

My first FP was a black plastic Sheaffer calligraphy set. It came with B, M, and F italic nibs and a selection of colored ink cartridges. I've lost it, but I have three very similar models now, as well as another oddball italic pen that takes standard international cartridges.

My first vintage FPs would have been the three I bought at a garage sale for $2 each about a year ago. I bought them on a whim, but didn't ever ink them. Luckily, they have some value, as I'm trading the Waterman to OldGriz for repair on the Eversharp and on my grandfather's Sheaffer Jr., which I recently got from my dad. The third of the garage sale pens is an Osmiroid with an italic nib. I'd really like to get that one inked up and see how she writes.

Now I just have to buy some ink. :-)

I first discovered fountain pens during the 1990's when it was still possible to encounter them in an ordinary bookstore here in Lahti, Finland. My first purchase was a Parker Frontier (red/black plastic with steel cap & gold plated nib and trim) made in USA in 1996. I knew nothing about pens back then but my schoolmate had a nice Parker flighter ballpoint which aroused my interest in their products. I then visited the bookstore and found some funny looking "modern but old-fashioned ink pens".

I enjoyed reading this thread.

The first fountain pen I remember was the one I HAD to buy for shorthand class in high school. It was a blue cartridge-filled Esterbrook with a metal cap. Unfortunately the cap got thrown away, but I still have the pen and empty cartridge. That pen, and a good friend I mentioned it to, are how I started collecting fountain pens and using them again.

I still remember vividly how my first fountain pen looks like. I was about six years old and on our elementary school after everyone got a pencil; we were given a fountain pen. We had to learn to write our first words and sentences with our own fountain pen.
It was a green Bruynzeel pen, with a metal cap. Mine was especially made for left handed writers. I loved writing with it and was very proud of my first pen. When others lost their pen and started writing with colored ballpoints, I couldn't let go of the Bruynzeel.
Later on when I was about 17 years old, my father gave me a black Waterman fountain pen.
Now, many years later... I have to admit, that I lost my Waterman... My search for a new fountain pen has started a few weeks ago.

Easy - a Sheaffer school pen. I was one of the very few using them in high school, and I jsut thought they were plain cool. You could also stomp the cartridges for some spectacular patterns in the school yard! I didin't use one again utill, oh, three months ago! When did I graduate you ask? None of your business!

I can't remember either of my parents using FP's; they were pencil and BP users. My first memory of a fountain pen was the cartridge pen I received on entering fourth grade in school, where we were all required to use them instead of pencils. Ballpoints were not allowed. Mine, as were virtually all others, was the $1.00 Sheaffer cartridge pen with the clear barrel to see the ink level. They came in a rainbow of colors, and began my love for Sheaffers that has lasted to this day. I can remember seeing those beautiful color ads in the National Geographic for expensive Sheaffer pens and wanting one someday myself. Well, over time I've owned many Sheaffer pens, but recently I've found cartridge pens on EBay just like the ones I grew up with. I've bought several, and after inking them, have new respect for any company that could manufacture such a durable, attractive, and ergonomic pen for only $1.00. I don't remember any Wearevers, Esterbrooks, or any of those competitors. I lived in a small town and we all used Sheaffer!

My first recollection of a fountain pen is not all that clear cut in my mind.

I was in school, don't remember quite how old. In my time we were supposed to write only in pencil until a certain age and after that we were introduced to pens. I used to write with fibre tips (Pilot V5's, Boxy and such). Ball points were not allowed as they were thought to encourage a lazy hand. Heaven knows what that meant. I wasn't exactly light handed, the nibs of the fibre or micro tips used to only last a few weeks at best.
Out of sheer desperation my father bought me a really cheap fountain pen (no wonder he would not let me use his). It was a make called Camel or something. you had to unscrew the nib end and fill it using a rubber dropper or syringe, it wasn't a self filler. It had a steel nib, which leaked a bit but by God was it great to write with. I fell in love with ink pens since. I still have it and it still writes but it leaks so I don't use it all that much. I also remember a few years after my dad bought me my first ink pen he bought me another one, a converter type pen so that I wold not get my fingers messy each time I filled my pen, it was a make called Miawadi or something. This pen got stolen form my pencil case one day at school, I was never to see it again.

My love for FPs has grown by leaps and bounds. I will not touch a ball point if I can avoid it. My collection is big and still growing.

Hallo

I used a Parker Slimfold in the 60s at school in England. I graduated to a Parker 51 and over the years continued using a fountain pen. As the only member of the family still using a fountain pen, I scavenged most of the family's fountain pens, which served as the basis of my collection. Since there are no more to scavenge, I now expand my collection at open markets, etc.

My best pen is a Parker Vacumatic, from the early 1930s, which belonged to my grandmother. It cost me a fortune getting it put back into working order.

Yours

Chaim

I remember grey fountain pen in my parents' desk - the hooded nib (which I definitely remember) and the the arrow at the tip (which I think I remember) would make it a Parker 61. I remember looking for it each time the desk was opened and it never wrote - I don't think they ever filled it.

I've just now really gotten into fountain pens.......my dad never throws anything away so I'm hoping the next time I visit my dad the pen will still be about somewhere!

I can remember sitting in 5th or 6th grade using a Sheaffer FP, it was (I think) clear blue and a metal top. I remember writing with it upside down. Ahead of my time? I am fairly sure it is the same pen I found during a storm some years ago and is responsible for my love of fountain pens today. Now all I need to do is re-learn some decent penmanship, and to sepell.

My first memory of a fountain pen is inextricably linked to the Sheaffer inlaid nib. It's the nib I remember and somewhere in the back of my mind, there's a little voice that still says "real fountain pens look like that."

I don't know whose fountain pen it was, or where I saw it. But I still have a thing for inlaid nibs and the look of integrated nibs. Probably why I'm so crazy about the Edson, the Verve, the Carene and the Waterman CF pens. Sexy nibs! I still think we should have a forum just for nibs...


/:)

When I was in fourth grade back in the 70s, I found a Shaeffer fountain pen for sale in a local five & dime. I think it cost less than $2, took cartridge ink (blue), and was probably a medium point. I wrote with that for a while, and can recall buying a second one for black ink.

Saw the same type pen not long ago in an antique shop in NH for $5. Came that close to buying it for purely nostalgic reasons.

pens in my father's drawer--a sheaffer, a wearever... i wanted them all!

I was in 6th grade (1972) and I bought a Sheaffers cartridge pen. I then bought a second one. I still have both and my daughters (8 and 10) use them. They are two VERY nice writers. Bought them at Thrifty drugs stores.... less than 2 bucks for sure.

My first memory is of my father's black "51" with a lustraloy cap that was always in his desk drawer along with a bottle of Blue/Black Parker Quink. He always kept his pen in the Parker case, I never saw him carry it in a jacket pocket.

I really coveted that pen until 1962 when my parents bought me my own Parker "51" And you guys wonder why I am a total "51" junkie, it is genetic I tell you. :bunny1:

Jim

My dad had a hooded Parker of some sort, I have no idea what to this day. I only realized that it was a fountain pen when I started coming here.

The first I ever used was an Osmiroid I bought at the Art Attack in Ypsilanti when I was at university (Eastern, not U of M). I wanted something I could load with any color of ink but smoother than a technical pen, and the proprietress suggested a fountain pen.

Shortly after I found at Kmart some (mostly) white plastic item with a red painted nib and graphics that seemed to have come from Look. It took international cartridges and I was able to fit it with the piston converter from that orange Osmiroid. I stopped using it when I dropped out of college, and the next FP after that was a blue Phileas many years later.

Greetings all,

When I was 8 years, (I was messing with dip pens and India ink since the age of 6), I had discovered my dad's old Sheaffer PFM from the late '50s buried in the back of a desk drawer. My dad cleaned it up, taught me how to load it and clean it and gave it to me.

Unfortunately, it was stolen in late 1978, but my dad replaced it in early 1979 with a Sheaffer (Triumph) Imperial that I still use today. As I write this, it dawned on me that while ink has always been my passion, I have my dad to thank for my affiliation with fountain pens.

From many of the posts in this thread and elsewhere, this seems to be a common practice- a lot of us were introduced to fountain pens through our fathers.

Best wishes,

Sean

Good topic, I've found the posts here very interesting.

My first memory is being about 7 or 8, and finding a fountain pen (capped so I didn't see the nib) and a bottle of ink in my father’s desk while getting him something. It was different enough that I remember it, but that's about it. I still remember the smell of old wood, and the shape of the bottle. Which leads me to believe that it was either a black or a blue/black Sheaffer ink.

My second memory comes from when I was about 19 and is of being in the bookstore of the university I attended, trying to find a new pen to replace one I had lost. If I remember correctly I was between classes and was trying to avoid studying. They had a section of pens with something I had never seen before: a fountain pen with the nib showing. It was cheep, had no manufacturers name (at least on the pen), and took international sized cartridges though the side of the pen which opens by twisting the barrel. I bought it because it was so different than what I was used to and wanted to know what it was.

What stands out the most is taking it to the local coffee shop, and meeting some friends. I put the cartridges in, but no ink came out so I gave it a good shake. The people I was with apparently knew more about fountain pens then I did and basically hit the deck. That's where I learned that vigorously shaking fountain pens is a bad idea.

I still have the pen I bought in university, and was given the Sheaffer School Pen that I saw as a child. I've got no idea as to what happend to the ink.

Kris

My first experience with dip pens goes back to Elementary school, in 1994, at a private academy here in Canada, where we learnt Monoline Spencerian.(Spencerian, but without the thick-thin variation.) This was done using rigid, or nail nibs.

My first experience with Fountain Pens comes back to around 1995-1996, when my dad bought an S.T. Dupont in a trip to Paris, and a red Sheaffer "School Pen" with a 304 nib, which is a pen I still hold on to up to this day. Then came the calligraphy writing. Blackletter, Italic, Roundhand, and such, which I have learnt with some Sheaffer Calligraphy fountain pens, then I moved to Dip pens once again for calligraphy, but I still hold on to my FPs for daily usage.

Yes, I am a 17 year-old which has had interests in beautiful writing since he was 8-9. A (rare?) particular characteristic, I have found.

My earliest recollection of the exsistence of fountain pens, sadly, was from an old Tom and Jerry cartoon. Jerry squirted ink in Tom's eyes using a lever filler. I asked my mom what that was and I rember her telling me stories of leaky pens and girl's braids dipped in the inkwell of their school's desks.

My first memory of an actual FP was while I was in college in Kansas. The president of the local Amateur Radio club used a FP, though I'm not sure what kind (I believe it was a Parker). I was facinated. I didn't know they still made them. I never got to know him well enough to ask about the pen.

Kevin
Beaker606

Hey Jim, you Parker 51 Junkie, you. I have a question that you might be able to answer. How does one tell if a wartime 51 gold filled cap is Vermeil or gold over brass? I have one that I would swear is gold over sterling. I collect silver and would say it feels like it is but is there any other way to tell?

PeteWK

My earliest memory was Christmastime, sometime back in early 1960s. My mom was writing out Christmas cards on a card table in the living room, and on the table was a bottle of Sheaffer blue-back Skrip.

Somehow I jostled the table--I may have been wrestling with my brother--can't remember--and that bottle fell onto the carpet. The resulting large stain stayed there until the carpet was replaced in 1970!

Regards,
dj

My first memory of an FP came about the time I was 9 or 10 years old in the early 80s. My great-grandparents were still alive, and we visited them at least once per week. They had a small antique writing desk at their house, which they allowed us to sit at and draw or write while we were there. There were two fountain pens in one of the drawers. Seems like one was green-striped celluloid and the other seemed to be orange. I thought they looked pretty, but wasn't allowed to do much more than look.

When my great-grandparents died, the pens disappeared.

A few years later, I noticed my grandmother writing with what turned out to be an inexpensive Sheaffer FP with a steel nib. She explained that it was a fountain pen and that those were the type of pens that everyone used to write with when she was younger.

I brought the topic up to my parents, and looked at the pens that were offered for sale in the Service Merchandise catalog. My mother said those pens were a bit pricey for someone who had never had an FP before, but offered to buy me a Shaeffer like my grandmother's. I took her up on it, and she let me pick one out at Woolworth's. I still have it. It's served me in some fashion for at least 18 years.

When my grandmother died, my mother gave me that pen that I first saw her using. It might not seem like much, but to me it's a precious thing. Dad gave me his school Esterbrook, and his father's Duofold Jr. It's nice when people care about you and want to help you with your hobbies.

I just can't help but wonder what happened to those pens that I saw in that drawer.

Thank you, William, for your story. I know my father had a green and black striped Sheaffer when I was little, stayed in a drawer with his WW II stuff. It disappeared after his death and I think it got accidentally thrown away.

Isn't it terrific when you can use something that a loved one had before you? I still have the wristwatch, a gold Mido, that my mother gave him on their first anniversary in the early fifties. I still wear it on occasion.

I tried a Sheafer fountain pen that used cartridges back in high school...not a good experience...I got more ink on my hands than I ever got on paper....

When I was around 10,

My dad had a montblanc. I think my dad had a 149 or a 146. It was stollen from him at one point.

After I always have been curious on FPs.

sigh....




I remember my parents had a Parker pen about 40 years ago. It sat for who knows how many years in a box after they started using ballpoint pens.

I, eager young engineer, decided one day to try this interesting gizmo. It would not write, and my mother suggested I flush it. I did, for what seemed an endless time until it flushed clear.

It worked great, but I made a huge mess. So I put it away. A few years later, I found it again, and this time, I decided (remember eager young engineer?) to find out how it worked.

So, I methodically opened it, and began to disassemble it. I remember tugging


at the metal bars along the sides of the sac until..... well, you get the picture.




It was unceremoniously disposed of. Since I was assimilated into the FP collective, I have regretted my experiment many times.