My Modest Collection Of Late-Production American Swans

[Estragon]

My focus on vintage celluloid pens with white trim has led me from the the Minors, Snakeskin, and Blackbird pens of the UK to the arrow clip models of Mabie Todd New York in the 1930s. I see that there've been a couple of threads about these pens over the years and thought I'd post a photo of my progress on this front.

 

 

I've been struck by how the subpar quality of these pens (thin plating and plastics, generic pressure bars, etc.) is belied by their large, heavy gold nibs, beautiful celluloid patterns, and interesting stylistic variations (e.g. knurled cap bands, more or less chamfered ends). Am I correct to assume the more streamlined models are of later vintage?

 

Before I discovered the grey lizard skin pen in the center, I'd always wished that Conklin had made their All American in this celluloid with nickel- as opposed to gold-plated trim — a more attractive and aesthetically consistent combination to my eye. As soon as I picked up the Swan, my Conklin went to a new home:

 

 

I confess I know very little about these late-production American Swans. So if anyone has any historical info or additional variants on hand, please don't hesitate to share!

[Cob]

Hardly modest: those pens look splendid!

 

Your comment about the quality is interesting; it seems that Mabie Todd USA was somewhat under pressure in the 1930s. The quality of the 1930s English production is excellent..

 

I cannot help really with information - I am an English MT enthusiast, but I am sure that Marc and Greenie will be able to help.

 

Cob

[Greenie]

Marc Shiman is a real expert in this. I have no doubt he will be by shortly. I have a real thing for snake and lizard patterns, and so I find that later swan lizard skin to be particularly great.

[Cob]

Incidentally, I have a nib feed and section from the very rare New York Visofil. Sadly the curly breather tube is not present (I broke it!) I have the green marbled cap too, in excellent order.

 

Cob

Edited February 5, 2018 by Cob

[PAKMAN]

Beautiful! I love the lizard !

[MarcShiman]

I'm not sure there's much to tell. They started tapering the caps and barrels in 32, but since there is very little of the way in print advertising after 32, its hard to know what was made when. There were two barrel lengths, and three girths (for 2, 4, and 6 size nibs - the 6 sizes of these pens are hard to find). They were cheaply made, as you said, but they still used substantive gold nibs.

 

There was one advertisement in Gimbels for a special buy on MT pens with arrow clips, something like $1.50 per pen.

 

There were a lot of different plastics used - again, no catalogues, so its really tough to figure out the whole "series" if there was one.

[MarcShiman]

Here are a few pictures. I'm a little ashamed of the photography given the gorgeous pictures from the OP

 

 

So start with a couple of lizard skins with a splash of red. These are interestingly jewel tops, or soldier clips depending on what you call them

 

 

here are a couple of 4 size arrow clips. The tapering at the top is different seemingly for each one. Was that different designs? Just no quality control?

 

 

More soldier clips, all of these the big boys with the 6 size nib.

 

 

This plastic was done in a bunch of colors - contrasting the two prominent post-Eternal designs

[Estragon]

Thanks so much for posting these, Marc. What an astonishing lineup! Intriguing how MT seemed to combined existing celluloids to create new patterns such as your lizard/marble and pinstripe/marble pens.

[MarcShiman]

Thanks. Acutally it would have been DuPont that blended the plastics, right down the road in Arlington NJ from Mabie Todd's barrel fabrication facilities.

 

They weren't allowed to make their barrels or do anything with plastics in Manhattan due to strict fire codes.

[Cob]

Thanks. Acutally it would have been DuPont that blended the plastics, right down the road in Arlington NJ from Mabie Todd's barrel fabrication facilities.

 

They weren't allowed to make their barrels or do anything with plastics in Manhattan due to strict fire codes.

That's really interesting Marc.

 

Were the Manhattan premises strictly for assembly and stock then? Where was the nib plant for instance?

 

Rgds

Cob

[MarcShiman]

You ever greet someone in a language where you only know the words for "hello" and "how are you", and then the native speaker thinks you are fluent and rattles on for three minutes in their language?

 

So, my understanding of how pens were made, despite lots of research, is sort of Hello, how are you, where do I find pizza in this town.

 

A lot of what I know, I don't really know, I assume. But here goes...

 

You might have come to learn that celluloid is a bit flammable. Hugely flammable. Burn down entire city blocks in a matter of hours flammable. There were something like 55 such fires in New Jersey over 40 years.

 

So, Manhattan thought it would be a pretty poor idea to make or fabricate celluloid there, and left it to NJ, America's sewer plastics capital at the time (I'm from NJ, I am born with the right to rag on it). There were four celluloid companies in the US, 3 in NJ and one in Massachusets. Two were major companies (DuPont's Arlington Works and the Celluloid Company). By the time pens came to use celluloid as their primary material of construction, the Celluloid Company became Celanese, and moved to Cumberland, Maryland to make Rayon. Pens' celluloid were pretty much made by DuPont under the Pyralin brand.

 

Two companies retrofitted Manhattan factories to fabricate celluloid barrels in compliance with NY fire codes that I know of - Waterman in the late 20's and Diamond Point in the mid-30's. Up until the 30's, Diamond Point made their barrels and caps in Conneticut. Eclipse and Mabie Todd had facilities in Arlington NJ (same as DuPont) and you'd have to think they were wrapping barrels and caps (nobody was turning barrels out of block from 1930 on - it was all sheets wrapped into barrels or tubes).

 

An article written by the son of the owner of Diamond Point said that from the mid 1920's (and probably earlier), everyone assembled parts from jobbers. Nibs, clips, barrels, caps, cap bands were generally all made by others. Probably the big boys made their own, but its hard to know.

 

I found a company in Burlington NJ called Sanite Corporation that probably made barrels and caps for other companies. I reach that conclusion tentatively because most of the patents for techniques and machines used to make barrels and caps belongs to Sanite (three guys held most of them). If you weren't called Parker, Sheaffer, Wahl, Conklin, or Waterman, I'm guessing you bought a lot of your parts rather than making them.

 

NYC's gold district then is now Wall Street - I don't know who made nibs in the 30's, but I'd be willing its a bunch of companies pen collectors never heard of before on what is now Wall Street.

 

So, my theory is that when MT switched from hard rubber to plastic, they rented a facility in Arlington and started turning barrels, then later wrapping barrels and sending them into Manhatten for final assembly. I bet they were stamping their own nibs, and making their own clips until they stopped making step clips. Guesses, all of them.

 

Interestingly, Camel took over that Arlington building from MT in 39... which is weird, cause I thought Camel was pretty much dead by that time. Mysteries.

[Cob]

Fascinaitng Marc, thanks so much for all the information.

 

I do know that in England, from about 1922 Mabie Todd's nibs were made by W L Merriam & Co, subsequently acquired by Mabie Todd. this makes it fairly easy to date early post-war (first war) English pens, since the English-made pens for a while had MT NY nibs. In fact I have had some pens from that period that carried the stamping "Mabie Todd & Co Ltd London and "Made in USA".

 

Cob

[Estragon]

Here's an interesting addition. My working hypothesis is that it's a pen MT made for the pharmacist Burroughs Wellcome. The trim configuration on the cap and imprint are discrepant, but it has the following MT features of pens in this thread: nib, ladder feed, HR section, lever (note the patented clasp), and pressure bar. Meanwhile, the unusual grey lizard/marble celluloid is recorded on American Swans (see Marc's photo above). As I received it with its original, ossified sac, the pen appears to be uninked, having no traces in its white(!) inner cap even. The barrel is imprinted "Burrows Welcome Pen," a play on the company's name perhaps.

 

My online research has yielded a lone result from years ago on the munsonpens blog. If anyone happens to know more, please do chime in!

 

 

 

 

 

 

Edited January 17, 2019 by Estragon

[PaulS]

thanks to all those who added information and pix for this thread - these pens are very desirable and attractive. Coming back to Estragon's original words and pix, I've looked at these but am not sure where I should be looking to see "knurled cap bands" - obviously not in the right place.

Like most, I find the lizards very appealing, and that Greek key on the welcome pen is unusual.

[Estragon]

The lizards are my favorites as well. It appears they were offered in 3 variations: 1. grey; 2. grey w/ red fleck; and 3. grey w/ alternating bands of marble. Still looking for an example of #2 with white metal trim (if it even exists)!

 

Coming back to Estragon's original words and pix, I've looked at these but am not sure where I should be looking to see "knurled cap bands" - obviously not in the right place.

 

 

Not sure if the quality is good enough, but if you can zoom in on the original photo I posted, you should be able to see them on the grey striped pen on the far right.

[PaulS]

many thanks for the suggestion of enlarging that first picture, and yes, I can now see this cap ring variation on that charcoal and grey striated coloured pen - the ring has a sort of cog wheel type effect - possibly unique.

[MarcShiman]

Burrows was a Cleveland stationer that Swan sold to from time to time.

[PaulS]

always risky saying something is unique, though this cog wheel pattern may indeed have been unique to M.T. - I've just noticed I have a mid '30s U.K. made leverless L245B - 62 (Wine & Silver) with three cap rings, of which the middle one has this cog wheel design.

In view of the subject title, hoping Estragon doesn't object to my adding details from a U.K. made pen - picture attached showing the cog-wheel/knurled cap ring - although unlike the op's cap mine has a single ring with this pattern, as opposed to all three rings. Have added since this feature not easy to see on the grey pen in the original picture.

Edited January 18, 2019 by PaulS

[Estragon]

Burrows was a Cleveland stationer that Swan sold to from time to time.

 

Ah – thanks so much for the correction. I'd never heard of Burrows stationer, which is much less of a stretch than my explanation.

[Greenie]

Other brands sometimes used patterns in the band - think Parker Vacumatic //\\//\\ pattern or the box ellipse. Or grecian borders on the Wahl Decoband.

 

Mabie Todd seemed to go for "textures" rather than overt patterns.

 

The 245 pens with deluxe bands have a middle band that has "reeding" resembling the edges of a coin, in between two smooth bands.

 

The Mabie Todd black and gold pens have several interesting "textures" in their bands- stacked coin, stacked coin grooves with wider smooth areas, tiny zig-zaggy patterns.