The Croxly Pen

[Okami]

I'd like to share my blog post on the Croxley Pen.

 

Please see the full post with photos and links here: Featured Pen - The Croxley Pen. Following is the text of the post:

 

 

The Croxley Pen - A Dickinson Product was a pen produced for John Dickinson Stationery, Ltd now Hamelin Paperbrands.

 

This company was originally founded in 1804 and was a pioneer of innovations in the paper industry:

 

John Dickinson patented a method of paper-making in June 1807, that rendered his rivals' techniques (principally the Fourdrinier machine) obsolete.

 

In 1850, the company started mechanical envelope manufacturing, with gummed envelopes for the first time.

 

The production of fine rag paper on electrically driven machines was a successful innovation at Nash Mill.

 

The company pioneered the production of window envelopes in 1929.

 

Today the legacy of the Dickinson Stationery is the Black n' Red product line of notebooks.

 

The Croxley Pen was probably made as a proprietary pen, without engraved identification of the maker. They were likely to have actually been produced by either the Conway Stewart Company or the De La Rue Company. (source: The Fountain Pen Emporium).

 

If you look at this photo of the Conway Stewart 466 from DreamPens, you can certainly see the reason for this claim. The similarities are remarkable with the only true cosmetic difference being the emblems on the clip and lever.

 

My pen is a black, blue and pearl marble. This dark color makes is difficult to photograph well and the photos do not do it justice.

 

The pen has a few flaws, the nib is not original having been replaced with a Canadian Waterman Ideal 2A, the clip has significant brassing and there is some separation in the top jewel right above the arrow clip. However, this pen is an excellent writer.

 

The nib is fine and firm with just a small amount of flex. I've been working on the alignment of the tines and we are almost there. As a result this nib has a little bit of tooth, but that's okay it has character.

 

Click to enlarge: (paper is Bloc Rhodia No 16