Blue Speckled Duofold.

[PaulS]

Despite appearances, this isn't black - probably made in Newhaven some time in the first half 1940s in the Old Style design of b.f. Duofold, and with what appears to be it's original N marked nib - length is c. 115 mm which suggest possibly either a Junior or Lady.

The section is a screw fit and there's an absence of any date code or Made In England on the barrel. When I opened it up the sac nipple was without any remnants of a sac, which looks to have come off the nipple cleanly and at some time looks to have become stuck to the inner wall of the barrel - the top centimetre of the bar had rusted and is still welded to the barrel.

It's a possibility that the black appearance of what was once a fairly striking bluish pen was caused by the failure of the sac which may have discharged its ink into the barrel, staining the celluloid.

 

Nothing particularly remarkable, but I bought this one because the colourway intrigued me - am sure it's not a marble colour as the flecks are too small - makes me think of lapis/white maybe (rather than straight lapis blue), but really not sure so all suggestions welcome.

 

Sorry the pix aren't good at showing the blue - the barrel is much worse than the cap, where at least you can see a hint of what the pen might have looked like originally. All thoughts welcome and thanks for looking.

[PAKMAN]

Not too uncommon to find a Lapis Blue Duofold that has darkened to this appearance. That would be my thought as to what it was originally. Probably 1928 or later as it is a streamlined model.

[PaulS]

thanks - you may well be correct, I'm no genius at Duofolds prior to the more common styling of the post 1950s Newhaven aerometric models, but hadn't thought this one could potentially be as old as you've suggested. The barrel imprint lacks any detail as to country of origin, so I'd assumed U.K.

Unfortunately, I do have one or two pens that started life bright and colourful, then suffered outgassing etc. ending up very dull - this colour deterioration is such a shame - some of those pens were beautiful once.

 

Perhaps you're correct about this one being lapis of some description - I know there were one or two variations of the colour.

[DrCodfish]

I am far from being an expert on Duofolds but I believe Pakman has it nailed.

 

You are right that it is a shame it is so discolored, I think the Lapis Duofolds are beautiful. Scroll down to PenrHero's thread on Duofiolds and you wills see a few that are discolored to varying degrees. I have one that looks pretty good,but certainly not pristine. you can see it in a thread i started here called A Black Duofold I Could Afford.

[Ricky2011]

is that the one i saw on that e**y auction site... @PaulS

[PaulS]

I'll swap the pen for Packman's shirt - it always gives me a smile ……………… the shirt I mean, not the pen;-)

 

I have just one decent looking lapis coloured pen that actually looks not far off what it did many years back - or at least I will have it when I can get to the post office.

Jade and onyx look perhaps even worse when they've suffered sac outgassing etc. - dirty green and dirty brown - at least you might argue that when lapis pens are shot they can pass for black. This Duofold is one of the celluloid compositions - perhaps a material that suffers more than others.

 

thanks for the link - will look shortly.

 

Hi Ricky - sorry to seem evasive - I'm not in the habit of discussing my purchases - just British reserve I suppose. I seem to have phases of picking a brand/model etc. and spending some time reading up and then buying a few examples for references purposes.

Only today I received a Sheaffer Balance (not a Lifetime model) - and was puzzled by the Nos. 5 - 30 on the nib.

IIRC, Richard Binder is saying this indicates the price back in the mid 1930s - so something new I've learned today - the pen is in Marine Green, and assume this is U.S. $ and not Can. $. - though the nib is a Made in Canada job - the barrel imprint looks to show TO...… might that be Toronto? If I have that wrong please put me right quickly - thanks.

 

Edited to add ………… the exchange rate back then puts the price more in perspective - it was probably more like four dollars to one pound Sterling.

Edited June 26, 2019 by PaulS

[ardene]

That probably is a mid- to late 1930s old style Newhaven-made Duofold in marbled blue and pearl. The pen originally was probably looking as a slightly more down-to-earth (due to technological limitations to making the rod material - my Lady Duofold in Black and Pearl has ground fish scales (!) in the plastic to make the white material iridescent and pearl like) version of the modern marbled blue Duofold discussed here https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=N-xU950d57Q Lapis lazuli Duofolds have usually smaller speckles of white and some thin waves of black on a blue background.

[PaulS]

thanks for the information - but now I'm sad that we've reduced the colourway to a pearl, rather than a lapis - but I can live with disappointment -though suspect a marble description is likely to be more correct.

 

Still struggling to arrive at a correct time line for this one, and having now looked in Troak's booklet re C20 history of pen manufacture at Newhaven - I.e. Felix Macauley, Valentine and then finally Parker - plus a re-reading of the big Duofold book, I venture the following ………

It does appear that for almost all of the 1930s pen production at Newhaven was by Valentine, and as such pens from that decade were marked accordingly, and didn't show Parker imprints. I have a Valentine - presumably mad some time in the '30s - in an 'old style' format that carries Valentine on the barrel and clip.

But I'm well aware that Parker did have a U.K. outlet (in London) during the first third of the C20, from which they sold pens that were assembled from Canadian parts - none of components for these pens was made in the U.K.

However, a Valentine/Parker connection seems to emerge at the very end of the '30s, so should we correctly say that this one could be a very late 1930s 'OId Style' Duofold - or, of course, very early 1940s? - in the absence of actual records then precise dating looks to be very difficult.

This dating is further complicated by the fact that - according to the books - the first pens to make their way out of Zocoola's Newhaven purchase were all assembled from Canadian parts - and it was the nibs only that were the first parts to be made in the U.K. - marked N.

Edited June 30, 2019 by PaulS

[Ricky2011]

i think you may be right @PaulS. never seen the lapis with anything uk imprinted....

 

seen Canadian and USA ones.. for std and lucky curve. not sure what mine was.. as many people will know i stated collecting a variety of parker models... 61, duos, 65 falcon... then moved into black duos and black vacs... and for the last 12 month the early british victories... swayed by the colur choice and the non stand size.. sorry to digress away from your original post..

 

have you another pen compare it to... i know the duo book has some pics... and the english duos where in 4 sizes... i think CAN & USA was only 3 no special size... might be wrong..

[PaulS]

regret a lack of other pens with which to make comparison Ricky - I've tended to be a jack-of-all-trades, which means that you never really get to be good at any one brand. But when I see a pen that appeals, I tend to collect a few of that make for a while and it helps with learing a some more. I once said I'd never collect Parker as there were too many and I dislike collecting when I know many will be beyond my budget - demonstrators and prototypes etc. - but that resolution went out of the window some time back. With the best will in the world unable to restrict my interest, but admire folks who do specialize and amass great knowledge.

 

On balance I'd still come back to the thought that nothing was coming out of Newhaven - marked with Parker imprints - before the end of 1930s.

Assuming the big book is anything to go by, then certainly Newhaven did produce a lapis - in fact they made some colours unique to England - and some of those now doubtless very rare.

Could be wrong, but it also appears - from the book - there's a possibility that U.K. Duofolds may have been the only examples of this model where the barrel imprint omits the country of manufacture.

 

Parker is such a vast subject it's difficult to get a grasp on overall accuracy.

[ardene]

I do not know very much about the Newhaven Duofold imprints (or Canadian ones) except that they generally read

 

GEO. S. PARKER REG.T.M.

DUOFOLD

 

The cap rings pattern along with the imprint will definitely help you out. I am also quite certain that Newhaven Duofolds had adopted a double-band, with bands of equal width, cap band design in the early '40s but the lapis might have been a de luxe model. I also do not know when the Newhaven factory stopped making the lapis or the marbled streamlined ones. You can ask someone like Jim Mamoulides if they are aware of any extensive resource on Newhaven Parker production.