What Was The Most Common School Ink?

[soapy]

i was wondering what was the most common school ink?

my schools where in the uk and BAOR germany and cant remember ever being supplied any ink.

would schools normaly supply blue or black ink?

the questions to people in all countrys

[brunico]

Blue in the UK - but I used my own black. My old university library had large bottles of Stephens blue and black at the librarian's desk (we weren't allowed to take our own ink bottles in).

[Silvermink]

Not one of the two countries you mentioned, but I know France's standard is J. Herbin Violette Pensée.

[Strang]

We used Sheaffer's Blue, Black, or Peacock Blue - but we had to buy it ourself (in the very early sixties in Canada.)

[carlc]

Parker Blue Cartridges (own supply) in a Parker 25 - bottled ink was a no no. Nobody else had a fountain pen - they all had BPs (oh okay there was one other - best girl in class - always sat at the front etc).

 

My eldest son is 8 and he is also asked to use blue ink in cartridges. I expect teachers have seen far too many accidents with bottles of ink.

 

Carl

[Joane]

In elementary school the teacher filled inkwells in the desk from a big bottle of black ink. I don't remember seeing any label on the bottle. However for my homework and for essays and such, I grew up with the original Scheaffer Skrip Blue-Black. Used it in elementary, high school and college, and for decades afterward at work and at home, until it packed up and moved to Slovenia. Today I console myself with Waterman's Blue-Black but that old Sheaffer's still remains my all-time favourite ink.

[soapy]

interesting storeys

i can imagine school kids with ink bottles would be a accident waiting to happen.

that's why i expected schools to supply it.

[Trebster]

I am nearly certain the school where my grandmother taught (U.S.) issued Sanford ink. Which color was provided for students, I can't say, but I remember quart Sanford bottles of red that she used to correct papers. My memory tells me she used Quink Black for personal correspondence. None could accuse her of irrational flights of fancy!

[corniche]

Hello Soapy,

 

I grew-up in the '70s/'80s and always used ball-points; most of my teachers frowned at FPs, (too many bad memories, I suppose). However, according to my mom, who grew up in Germany, used Pelikan blue and my dad can't remember what brand they used, (he's 86 and has had a couple of strokes, so I knew it was a long-shot when I asked him).

 

Best regards,

 

Sean

 

[voop]

Not one of the two countries you mentioned, but I know France's standard is J. Herbin Violette Pensée.

 

Historically, probably, in the lil' school clases.

 

Later, it became - or seems to have become - Waterman "bleu effaçable", at least, that is. what I see students in French schools today use.

[Feanor]

I've heard that Pelikan washable royal blue was very popular for a long time in Germany. Not sure if it still is.

[jgrasty]

I used Sheaffer black ink cartridges during high school in the 1970s. I don't remember anyone using fountain pens but me, though, so take this for what it's worth...

[welch]

We had to buy our own ink, in Maryland in the late '50s and early '60s. We chose from:

 

- cartridge or ink bottles

 

- Sheaffer or Parker

 

- Blue, black, or blue-black

 

- Washable or permanent

 

(We never used dip pens, though one year each desk had a "vestigial" black plastic inkwell)

 

(added:) As I remember, we never saw Waterman ink or pens. In fact, I thought Waterman was a British company from the TV advertisements about the "poor deprived" WASPy preppy who had never had a Waterman pen.)

Edited October 26, 2010 by welch

[johniem]

As I recall, until high school it was black only. Ink was provided by the teacher (or school, maybe) and one had to go to the teacher's desk to refill. Only in senior high school was blue/black allowed, and by then we provided our own. Blue was never allowed, and its use was a guarantee of a failing grade. Time frame: from 1940's to 1954. I remember that our school desks always had a hole in the upper right hand corner, supposedly for the "ink bottle". I could never understand why I would want to put an ink bottle in the hole, because there was no bottom and the bottle would fall through.

Edited October 26, 2010 by johniem

[Parse Error]

Now, it's probably Noodler's HOD. People really don't notice that it's fountain pen ink until they see that the paper is perfectly flat. Besides, it's cheap.

[saintsimon]

It's only genuine school ink if it's erasable, filled in cartdriges and is used together with a popular ink eradicator.

 

Also, in an authentic school setting you need to borrow every now and then a cartridge from a classmate, and you must be aware which of them has compatible carts.

 

In my school life it was erasable Pelikan Royal Blue in cartridges stuck into a blue/stainless Pelikano and accompanied by a Pelikan "Tintenkiller". The opposing faction in class used GeHa pens with their incompatible cartridges, before Lamy Safari's appeared on the scene. All with Royal Blue erasable ink, of course.

 

Since then, I strictly avoid the boredom of Royal Blues ...

Edited October 26, 2010 by saintsimon

[esterbex]

'60's Catholic elementary school had us using Sheaffer blue and blue-black cartridges while sitting at wooden desks still equipped with inkwells....Bic came later....

[Jerome Tarshis]

The hole in the upper right corner of the (American) school desk was not for the students to store their ink bottles. It was to hold an inkwell built into the desk. In principle either the teacher or a student designated as the class ink monitor would fill the inkwells by pouring ink into them from a large bottle. In the schools I went to, the inkwell had a hinged brass lid, to keep dust or other unwanted substances from falling into the ink. When ink was needed the student at the desk could lift the lid.

 

By the time I was in elementary school the above arrangements were fading into the historical past, but they still existed. I lived through the period when dipping a girl's pigtail into the inkwell was part of primary-school life.

 

Inkwells were not always removed from the desks as soon as they went out of use. There was a transitional period when the inkwell, basically a ceramic receptacle for ink, remained in place and served to accumulate wads of paper, paper clips, and other detritus of childhood. Eventually, at least in some schools, the inkwells were removed from the desks, leaving that mysterious hole. I've literally forgotten what I did about ink if I needed to refill a pen during the school day. (Often enough I wouldn't; filling the pen at home in the morning would be good enough most days.) Whether we brought ink bottles to school and kept them in our desks, or refilled pens with ink supplied by the school, at the teacher's desk, I have no idea.

 

I went to school before cartridge pens, so bottles or ink poured into inkwells were the only source of ink if one needed to refill a pen.

 

So far as I can remember, there wasn't any single school ink that dominated the classroom to the extent that Pelikan Royal Blue seems to have dominated it in Germany. Adults used the same kind of ink for office work. I do remember that offices supplied ink to their employees, but it was a matter of some indifference whether it was Parker or Sheaffer or a different brand. In those simple times it wasn't Noodler's or Private Reserve, far less Rohrer & Klingner or De Atramentis.

[corniche]

As I recall, until high school it was black only. Ink was provided by the teacher (or school, maybe) and one had to go to the teacher's desk to refill. Only in senior high school was blue/black allowed, and by then we provided our own. Blue was never allowed, and its use was a guarantee of a failing grade. Time frame: from 1940's to 1954. I remember that our school desks always had a hole in the upper right hand corner, supposedly for the "ink bottle". I could never understand why I would want to put an ink bottle in the hole, because there was no bottom and the bottle would fall through.

 

 

Hello Johniem,

 

It wasn't always a hole, there used to be a metal or glass cup in that hole that served as an ink reservoir. But Johnny dipped Suzy's pigtail in the ink-well once too many times, and they took them out. They were kind enough to leave the hole behind.

 

All the best,

 

Sean

 

[corniche]

DRAT! Jerome beat me to the punch while I was laboriously proof-reading my entry. BTW, why is there such a conflict in the post times? It only took me a few minutes and Jerome's post wasn't there yet, now each post has a two hour time difference- is it a West Coast/East Coast type of deal?

 

Sean

 

 

* Edit, fixed typos.

Edited October 26, 2010 by S. P. Colfer