When Did "ball Points" Become The "standard Pen" For Most People?

[Charles Skinner]

I remember using a real fountain pen in some of my early grades. I can not remember, for sure, if I used them in high school, 1953-1955, My question is --- when did almost EVERYBODY change to "ball points."

 

C.

[pajaro]

August 23, 1962.

[ravantra]

August 23, 1962.

10:28:42 AM

[Denpen]

At 10:28:53 my shirt was stained by ballpoint pen ink.

[rochester21]

My answer comes as a question: who invented and advertised the ballpoint pen ? those are the real criminals.

[J English Smith]

Probably a strong correlation with manufacturing unit counts of the Parker Jotter. And I assume banks and other merchants started to give cheaper BPs away as promo items in the late 50s, too. Those were the ones that "leaked..."

[torstar]

When I started writing with ink around September 1974.

 

Isn't that the deep down thought process for 98% of interenet resonses?

[usk15]

In the moment that to change a ballpoint refill was cleaner than to ink a fountain pen....i think....so probably late 70's to 80's.

[ravantra]

And now for some more "serious" history …

 

http://inventors.about.com/library/weekly/aa101697.htm

Edited June 28, 2013 by ravantra

[gwet432]

Actually, Bíó László invented the ball point pen in 1938, but production didn't start until 1943, when the RAF supplied his pens to pilots, because they worked better at high altitude. His patent was bought by Marcel Bich in 1945, who later founded the Bic company.

[gwet432]

And now for some more "serious" history …

 

http://inventors.about.com/library/weekly/aa101697.htm

 

Oh come on!!! That's not fair... I was writing my post when you posted.

I forgive you but just this once.

[51ISH]

 

Oh come on!!! That's not fair... I was writing my post when you posted.

I forgive you but just this once.

Nope.....

 

Not only is it not fair......IMHO it's a cop out.....

 

Post away my friend......

[MisterBoll]

This is a bit like Lp vs. CD where convenience wins with the general public.

[RLTodd]

First, fountain pens were not popular where I grew up. I can only recall seeing one in frequent use, and from when I started school in 1950 all I saw were pencils. The old desks still had inkwell holes, but no one recalled using them. Indellible or "ink pencils" were popular.

 

I seem to recall Papermates and Parker Jotters comming in around 1956, maybe 1957. They slowly overtook and passed the pencil use.

 

Now I usually see inexpensive stik type ballponts. I still don't see fountain pens around here. I usually get the "what a strange looking pen" when I carry one out and about.

 

I still think 1956 or 1957 though.

[ravantra]

 

Oh come on!!! That's not fair... I was writing my post when you posted.

I forgive you but just this once.

Sorry, please post away.

[MC_in_Houston]

Fountain pens were killed by government bureacrats and accountants with their triplicate carbon copies. They were finished off by the multi part credit card receipt. It happened in the late 60's.

 

There is an interview of one of the Parkers out there that mentions that sales just fell off a cliff by the early 70's when the family sold the business.

[Moynihan]

For "most people" they switched to the ball points in the middle 1950's, at least in the U.S.

[Tom Aquinas]

I can recall as a very young boy, seeing a rush on these "new pens" in the mid 1950's. What really kicked them off was the "click" pen. I used a Bic click pen in high school for a while as well as the Shaeffer cartridge fountain pen. Interesting I can still recall seeing really cheap fountain pens at stores in Australia like G.J.Coles & Co, Woolworths and Penney's Ltd ( I think they are equivalant of the US 5 and Dime ? or Walmart ?

 

My mother incidentally in those early days preferred me to have my Shaeffer fountain pen in my pocket because the propensity to leak was dramatically less.

[GabrielleDuVent]

I never stopped using them, but I did stop using them in school for five, six years. This was when I moved to the US and discovered that there are people who steal just about anything, never mind that they can't use it. (Never had anyone steal my pen when I was in the UK because everyone had a fountain pen and what's the point of having two?)

[pencils+pens]

The 1957-1960 period in the article is correct for the US. I started writing with fat pencils in Kindergarten. The nuns insisted we use cartridge fountain pens to learn cursive in third grade. By fourth grade we could use either fountain pens or ball points and most kids had switched to ballpoints. Most kids used a BIC stick. A Parker Jotter was considered more upscale. Parker originally advertised the Jotter as the T-ball Jotter to differentiate itself from its competition. The "T" stood for tungsten and it was what made the Jotter a smooth writer and a bit more expensive.

 

Originally the BIC stick pen came in three barrel colors. Clear was the standard point. Yellow/orange was the fine point and white (my favorite) was extra fine or accountant fine. The end plug and cap color was the color of the ink. At one time, they all came with black, blue, red or green ink. The latter was my favorite. If you pulled out the refill and end plug and covered up the vent hole you had a first class spit ball shooter.

Edited June 29, 2013 by pencils+pens