Is The Moore-Evans Labeled Pen A Special Wahl?

[butch46]

I have one of those private labeled pens, a BCHR that aprears to be an early pre-1925 Wahl wide band pin, except that it has a simple crescent rather than a lever for a filler mechanism. Below is the reply that I added to a 2012 "Sunday History Lesson..." thread by WWII Warbird Fan (which I subsequentlu cannot find on FPN):

 

 

I realize this is an old thread, but I have one of those Moore & Evans pens and am trying to figure out who made the thing. It is black chased hard rubber with a crescent-style filler and some sort of roller on the end of the gold color clip.

The body is chased with a wave-like pattern and is engraved with "Moore & Evans" and beneath that "Chicago". [Moore & Evans Wholesale Jewelers]

The bottom of the cap has a 16mm wide gold color ring with a floral design and on the side just below the clip is an oval area about 10mm tall x 15mm wide for personal engraving (not engraved on this pen).

The crescent is a thin (abt 1.5mm thick), 17mm wide where it exits the body slot, and rises about 5mm above the body. There are no designs or other markings on the crescent which is of a silver colored metal.. [no locking ring to keep it from being pressed accidently]

The cap unscrews 1 1/4 turns revealing gold colored nib.. The name MOORE is vertical with the M an R in block letters, the two O's connected like links on a chain, and the E is very rounded ( like a C with a center line). Then horizontally is the word LIFE, below that MANIFLEX, then 14KT at the bottom. The nib hole is heart shaped.

I would think that the unusual clip with the roller on the end might narrow down who made the pen. [a Wahl with a Moore nib?]

Also, I didn't know that anyone other then Conklin made crescent fill pens. I thought maybe someone got creative, removed the lever from a lever fill pen, and fabricated a crescent in the place of the lever -- but there is no sign of the little "fingernail cutout" that would have been at the end of a lever.

[notes added to original posting in brackets]

So, what it this wierdo?

EuGene Smith

Edited July 25, 2019 by butch46

[butch46]

Here are a couple pictures that I copy/pasted from one that I found on-line. I don't know how to take a picture of my pen and put it on line, but my pen is just like this except it has turned a bit more brownish (oxidized?)

 

 

[butch46]

Oh, dear, one picture did not print in the previous message, so here it is...don't know why it is smaller?

 

 

EuGene

[butch46]

...also, the inscription is not filled in with the nice white paint to make it stand out. The engraving on my pen would not be noticeable if a person were not specifically looking for it.

 

the pen is 5 3/4" capped, 5 1/4" uncapped, & 6 7/8" posted.

 

 

 

This is another picture I found on-line. The engraving is not filled in with white and is harder to read, just the same as my pen.

 

Smiff

Edited July 26, 2019 by butch46

[butch46]

A couple of Boston Pen Co./Wahl Eversharp guys in Little Rock studied the pan and said it was a transition pen from the time when Eversharp bought out the Bpston Pen Co. It was supposedly produced from a Boston crescent fill prototype with their roller clip cap.

Eversharp, a mechanical pencil company, entered the fountain pen market with the purchase of Boston Pen, and used the Boston designs and patents to produce the Wahl pens virtually unchanged, just re-branded. Included early in the merger of the companies were transition pens such as this crescent fill pen which did not continue into production by Wahl Eversharp.

The Wahl collectors went nuts over it when I showed it at a pen club meeting!

When examined by some Wahl-Eversharp collectors at a Pen Club meeting, they said it was a transition pen made from Boston Pen Co. parts and prototypes that were on hand during the early period when Eversharp (a mechanical pencil company not yet named Wahl) was merging the recently purchased Boston Pen Co. into Eversherp.

 

Eversharp, desiring to enter the pen market, purchased Boston Pen and utilized the parts stock and prototypes of the latter company during the transition period. This "FrankenWahl" crescent filler was a transition pen produced from parts, including the roller clip and crescent filler, from the existing Boston Co's inventory.

 

It is unknown how many were produced in the style of the pen featured in this thread, but the above pictures show that at least two of them exist, and more are likely to be extant as well.

[butch46]

I showed the pen to a couple of Eversherp-Wahl collectors at a Pen Club meeting and they went gaga over it. According to them it was a transition pen from the time when Eversharp bought the Boston Pen Company and was assembled from various pieces of Boston's parts stock.

 

They apparently assembled a few of them for the Moore and Evans Wholesale Jewelry Co., engraved with that company's name. The pen guys didn't know they had made them or how many were made, but as one can see from this thread, they were not a one-off item.

 

By the way, they were made during the transition period around 1915-1917, however my pen has a replacement nib, a 1940's Moore nib, but does have an original Boston Pen Co. feed.

[Greenie]

It appears to be the filling system from a Grieshaber hump filler. Also Chicago based.

 

As for other hump or crescent fillers,

there is the Evans with the locking ring at the edge of the hump, not the middle

The Wirt hump filler

Boston safety hump fill with external sliding lock

and of course the Conklin

 

I can show pics and patents later when I am not at work. Meeting tonight - so probably this weekend.