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In 1934, after having finished its conversion from hard rubber to celluloid, Waterman needed something really new to punch up its image. “New,” did I say? Well, sort of. The old reliable Postal (bulb) filler, tarted up with a compound lever arrangement that would have made old Rube proud, appeared on a dramatic new line of Art Deco-styled pens called Waterman’s Ink-Vue. These babies came in striking colors that had appeared a year earlier on the Nº 7, called Silver Ray and Emerald Ray. Later Jet joined the Ink-Vue line, and later yet came Copper Ray, which I consider the prettiest of all. My Copper Ray is a nearly perfect specimen, marred only by the usual ambering of its barrel celluloid. Its fine flexible nib writes marvelously. At 5³/32" capped, 6⁵/8" posted, it’s a pen fits comfortably in the pocket and is “typically Waterman” in the way it posts very long for its size.

Waterman began its conversion from hard rubber to celluloid in 1929 with the introduction of the Patrician, an oversize pen of classic Art Deco design. A year later, the diminutive Lady Patricia joined her larger brother, and in 1932 Waterman added to its offering the gorgeous Moss-Agate color worn by my Lady Patricia. (Byt the Lady Patricia didn’t appear in Moss-Agate until 1934.) At 4²¹/32" capped and 5¹/8" posted, this really is a lady’s pen — but it also features a very good “military” clip. Its semiflexible fine nib is smooth and reliable.

The conversion continued with other models. The Ideal Nº 92 and its sister, the Ideal Nº 92V, made the switch around 1932, and my Green Pearl 92V is a nearly perfect example — this color frequently fluoresces. My pen is 4¹/4" capped and 5¹³/32" posted. Like my Lady Patricia, it has a smooth semiflexible fine nib.

Pelikan introduced a reliable screw-knob piston-filling pen in 1929, and many European manufacturers — especially in Germany — followed suit. But piston fillers didn’t catch on in the United States. Back in the day, the only successful U.S.-made piston filler was the Conklin Nozac (“no sac”), which made its appearance in 1931. In 1934 the company took the visible ink supply a step further with its unique “Word Gauge” feature. Word Gauge Nozacs were marked on the barrel to indicate how many words the remaining ink supply ought to provide. (I’ve put the emphasis on the “ought to” part, as nib size and flow adjustment would naturally have an effect.) My 5000-word Nozac Word Gauge came out of my parts drawers, so the major portion of my investment in it is labor. A lot of it. I don't think Conklin gilded the capacity markings, but I think the gilding looks cool. The pen is 5⁷/32" capped and 6³/16" posted, and it writes very nicely with a smooth fine stub.

Back in the day, a demonstrator was a pen made for shop assistants to use in showing the pen’s features to prospective purchasers. I stumbled over an opportunity to own this Nozac demonstrator; and although there are a few stress cracks in the barrel such that I don't think it’s safe to use, I went ahead and bought it anyway. It’s been restored, and it’s a wonderful educational device. At 5⁷/32" capped and 6³/32" posted, it’s about as standard as it can get for a Nozac. The redder part of the barrel is the ink reservoir, showing pretty clearly now ink can discolor celluloid by oxidation. (The color pervades the entire thickness of the barrel in the darker area; it’s not simply staining.)

Interestingly, Conklin didn’t restrict the Nozac sobriquet to the excellent piston fillers for which the name was created. Sometime in the middle of the 1930s, almost certainly after Sheaffer did it, Conklin came out with a plunger filler called the Nozac Q.F. (Quick Filling). Outwardly almost identical to its piston-filling sibling, it nonetheless bears a few giveaway markers. The blind cap is more smoothly bullet-like in shape, and the Word Gauge makes clear that this pen has a much greater capacity than the piston version (8M on this pen’s barrel vs. 5M on the barrel of the same-sized piston pen above). With a nice smooth — but otherwise ordinary — fine nib, my Q.F. is 5⁹/32" capped and 6¹/4" posted.

Everyone knows Tiffany. But not everyone knows who actually makes Tiffany’s products. At different times, different pen manufacturers have provided writing instruments for Tiffany; in the 1920s, New York’s W. S. Hicks & Sons made quite a few. My Hicks Tiffany is solid 14K gold, but it’s not heavy -- instead, it’s very nice repoussé work on a relatively thin metal body. At 3²⁵/32" uncapped and 4¹/32" capped, it’s a small pen. I don’t know how long it would be posted because I’m not willing to risk scoring the gold barrel. The nib is a WARRANTED medium that writes smoothly.

© 2008 Richard F. Binder

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