Gold Bond flat-top Barrett-made. Rather nice.

Picked this up recently.   I've been writing about Gold Bond pens, made for Montgomery Ward by a  variety of manufacturers. I have catalogues from 1930-38 or so. The flat-tops shown do not have the triple band at top of cap. Perhaps that was offered slightly earlier.

So, Duofold-orange Senior with fancy cap-style. BTW, all four cap-bands  are hallmarked 14k

regards

d

Had a chance to buy this pen twice though on eBay it was sold by itself rather then in a large lot, I did not know that the bands were marked. Nice buy David!

Okay, how about expanding the Barrett/ National connection a bit more. Line this pen up with a National made Good Service of similar style and there's not much difference....solid gold bands excluded!! They are a beautiful style of pen with that band set up imo.

Regards

Hugh

Oh, I can do the Barrett/National-"Gold Bond"- "Gold Medal", etc., connection one better. I just need to get around to it.

regards

d

Lovely, pen, David.

I have a small ring-top Gold Bond.  Just filled her up as she has been sleeping.

Lovely, pen, David.

 

I have a small ring-top Gold Bond.  Just filled her up as she has been sleeping.

Let's see

-d

Here she is:

Zoe

The large flat-top pens mostly were named Hercules by Gold Bond, though I'm not sure the special-trim pens didn't have a different model name.

Bought her from an English dealer, and will have to look carefully at the nib but it has a rather flexible gold nib.

Did you get yours here?

Very nice, Zoe. A circa ~ 1930 Gold Bond Triumph, ringtop. I assume it has a "warranted #4" nib, not the (released a year or so later) "Gold Bond " nib?

Oh, I have a bunch. I've written a couple articles on the label and am working on more.

Here is part of my collection of ~1930 Flat-Tops, and flat-ended pens with decorative knurling and a bit of streamlining, dating to 1932 or so.

regards

David

Oh, David, am I green with envy.

interesting. i have a big, duofold-senior size woodgrain barrett. what else is basically known about this brand or maker?

Hi Jose,

I know a bit about labels we believe made by Barrett/National. There have been  a couple online discussions of that sort before.  I have strong observational evidence that Montgomery Ward's early Gold Bond pens and Sears's (yeah, the "s's", probably is correct) Diamond Medal pens  were made by Barrett.

There has been a tendency to treat National as the main label, akin to Sheaffer being the maker of Sheaffer, WASP, Vacuum-Fil, Craig, etc. , the difference being that a tiny minority of "National" pens are marked National, unlike the Big-5 pens, whose majority of pens are imprinted with the company name.

As I wrote in my Gold Bond articles last year:

America's Big Five pen manufacturers from the 1930's included Parker, Sheaffer, Waterman, Wahl-Eversharp, and Conklin. All five manufacturers also sold generally less expensive off-label pens, pens which generally carried no markings tying them directly to their respective makers. While some clearly were lower quality products, the best appear to have had manufacturing specs similar to their main-brand equivalents. Another company of significance in play for the off-label market was National, with its somewhat unusual business model, issuing most of its pens as “brands” not its own, thus falling somewhat under today's collectors' radar relative to the Big Five, who had trumpeted their own labels far more mightily. National sold nearly everything off-label, its pens often branded/rebranded for sale by catalogue shops and by brick-and-morter store chains.

 

In fact, while the hobby (if I might generalize) tends to assume that National was the core entity, it is not clear to me that this was so.  Information about National/Barrett is sparse.

In fact it is possible that National was just one more label for Barrett. Evidence-- subject to overreading/misinterpretation-- points both ways.

In my article about Wahl's Equi-Poised for the first issue of Paul Erano's Fountain Pen Journal (I recommend subscription), I offered a snippet of the lawsuits that Sheaffer pursued against Featherweight and Eagle. Notice who backed off from copying Sheaffer's Balance in the face of the Cease and Desist letters:

The Wahl company was warned. Presumably had it been necessary, the "Parker Pen Company", "LE Waterman", "Chilton" would have been warned too.  But, "National" was not warned. Instead, the CE Barrett company was warned. 

There is evidence pointing oppositely too, that labels made by CE Barrett (eg. Gold Medal) fell under a National umbrella. But, that is a tale for another day.

I would enjoy working again on a list (publicly, here) of labels made by Barrett.    FPN had something like that a few years back.

The Barrett/National structure still is but weakly explored.

regards

d

I've seen a Barrett branded pen, knowing of a connection with National all I can say is it ( in this case) had no features that suggested a link. It's remarkable that National's history is so lacking given the output and general quality of their pens. While I've often heard Barrett and National linked there always seems a bit missing !! I'd have simply called the pens in question as National made (whatever Barretts connection) . I also note some National products appear in Conklin colours with Conklin style feeds (Lincoln being the one that comes to mind), interesting period.

Regards

Hugh

I'm bringing my GB collection to the Ohio Pen Show this weekend (Nov 8).  Drop by to discuss these interesting pens.

regards

David