10 replies to this topic

[djohannsen]

I'm still trying to learn the most basic elements of 1940's Sheaffer's pens, but am having difficulty finding a reasonably comprehensive reference. So, I apologize in advance for cluttering the board with questions for which answers could probably be fairly easily found, if I just knew where to look...

My first question pertains to filling system. To restrict scope, let me just ask about "White Dot" pens. Was every Sheaffer's "White Dot" model available as a lever filler, in addition to the (more commonly found?) wire or Touchdown filling variant? I "know" that the Sentinel Deluxe lever filler was availible only in Black, so do similar restrictions apply to other models, as well? (I've seen a lever filling Crest with "White Dot" on the barrel, that also happens to be Black.)

My second and third questions pertain to the Tuckaway. Would it be correct to say that after the introduction of the TRIUMPH in 1942, every model included a Tuckaway variant? After the intro of the TRIUMPH in 1942, were there any lever-filling Tuckaway pens produced, in any line? (I read at Mr. Binder's site that the Tuckaway was initially available only in lever filling version, in solid gold and goldfill finishes.)

Again, sorry for the uninteresting questions. A pointer to a reference would be just as welcome as spoon feeding me the answers.


Dave

[matt]

...My first question pertains to filling system. To restrict scope, let me just ask about "White Dot" pens. Was every Sheaffer's "White Dot" model available as a lever filler, in addition to the (more commonly found?) wire or Touchdown filling variant? I "know" that the Sentinel Deluxe lever filler was availible only in Black, so do similar restrictions apply to other models, as well? (I've seen a lever filling Crest with "White Dot" on the barrel, that also happens to be Black.)

My second and third questions pertain to the Tuckaway. Would it be correct to say that after the introduction of the TRIUMPH in 1942, every model included a Tuckaway variant? After the intro of the TRIUMPH in 1942, were there any lever-filling Tuckaway pens produced, in any line? (I read at Mr. Binder's site that the Tuckaway was initially available only in lever filling version, in solid gold and goldfill finishes.)

Again, sorry for the uninteresting questions. A pointer to a reference would be just as welcome as spoon feeding me the answers.

Dave

Dave,

Uninteresting, no; confusing, yes! Here's a partial answer; others will know if the Sentinal, Valiant, and Crest were all offered in both filler types. Some of this carries over into the injection molded plastic era, but my comments are restricted to celluloid.

The first Tuckaway was the open nib, all gold fill and solid gold, in lever fill, then vac-fil. The Lifetime "Triumph" series which followed, circa '42-45, has clipless Tuckaways in both plastic cap (1250 price code, very wide cap band) and all metal Crest. The full size Lifetime "Triumph" can be found in both LF and, most commonly, VF. Tuckaways are VF only. Don't know if there were other models in the Lifetime series.

Then, post war, circa 1946, we get an explosion of models:

Bead band, 275 price code, chrome trim, solid clip, 23 nib
Cadet, approx 5", both LF and VF
Minerva, don't know, assumed to be Tuckaway length with full size clip, filler types?

Bead band, 350 price code, GF trim (chrome on grey), solid clip, 33 nib
Craftsman, approx 5", both LF and VF
Diana, don't know same as Minerva

Bead band, 500 price code, GF trim (chrome on grey), self-adjusting clip, 59 Triumph nib
Admiral, approx 5", both LF and VF
Milady, don't know
later Admiral has Feather Touch 5 nib and only in LF
doesn't seem to be a ladies equivalent w/ Feather Touch 5 nib

Bead band, 875 price code, GF trim (chrome on grey), self-adjusting clip, 79 Triumph nib, white dot
Sovereign II, approx 5", both LF and VF
Lady Sheaffer (tuckaway), approx 4 1/2", vac-fil only

3/16" cap band, 1000 price code, etc., Triumph nib, white dot
Statesman - full size
Tuckaway II, vac-fil only

1250 price code
Valiant, same name for full size and tuckaway, two different width cap bands
Sentinel, brushed metal cap, GF cap band, same name for full size and tuckaway

Crest and Autograph/14K band, same name for full size and tuckawy

post bead band with 1/4" cap band,
875 price code, open nib, generally no white dot (Sheaffer literature shows a Sovereign w/ a WD)
Sovereign, full size
Lady Sheaffer tuckaway (generally have a Lifetime nib), vac-fil

1/4" cap band, 1000 price code, Triumph nib, white dot
Statesman?? full size
Tuckaway II

Other than the first all metal Tuckaway, I think Tuckaways were only vac-fil.

All pencils, even chrome trim to match the Cadet seem to have self adjusting clips.

Have yet to find a Minerva, Diana, or Milady, but I picture them as a tuckaway length barrel and a full length clip on the cap. The 23 Cadet, 33 Craftsman, and 59 Admiral appear in the Pen Sac Co Sheaffer list of sac sizes, the 3 ladies models do not. The 3 ladies models do appear on Gerry Berg's list of rod lengths, so they may have been made only in vac-fil all using the same tuckaway length barrel. http://fountainpenbo...nd-model-names/

Hey, it only gets confusing when you add in the switch from full barrel to internal tube vac-fil (which have 3 different types of barrel stripes) and late lever fill pens with screw-in sections and metal thread rings (these use the same cap as the vac-fil)...not to mention several variations of visulated section. Plus several models of plastic-cap pens in both sizes can also be found with the white dot on the end of the cap instead of above the clip. And the series only lasted about 3 years....

Corrections/additions are welcome.

Matt

[djohannsen]

Uninteresting, no; confusing, yes!

Matt:

You've succeded in making my head hurt. I hadn't realized how naive I was about the complexity of the Sheaffer line during this period. No wonder that I couldn't find a simple list of the models and periods that they were offered - the cleaning of the Augean stables is a simple task compared to compiling such a list.

As I get past the shock of seeing all that information, let me say thank you for taking the time to compile it. I've printed it and will try to make sense of it, as soon as I recover from the swoon into which I've fallen... I have the personality type of a "completionist' collector, and you've made me realize that I need to choose very carefully a collecting niche if I don't want to bankrupt myself.

I wonder why Sheaffer had so many models. It seems like production and stocking complexity and costs would kill them. I understand wanting to offer consumers a choice, but this really seems excessive.

Well, let me mull this over. Again, thank you for the huge dump of inofrmation. I've ordered the 1947 Sheaffer's Workbook reprint from Bill Acker. When it arrives, I will pair it with your list and see if I can start to figure things out.

Have a great weekend,

Dave

[david i]

SNIP

My first question pertains to filling system. To restrict scope, let me just ask about "White Dot" pens. Was every Sheaffer's "White Dot" model available as a lever filler, in addition to the (more commonly found?) wire or Touchdown filling variant? I "know" that the Sentinel Deluxe lever filler was availible only in Black, so do similar restrictions apply to other models, as well? (I've seen a lever filling Crest with "White Dot" on the barrel, that also happens to be Black.)

I'm still sorting info, but per the Sheaffer papers, most white dot models (but not all colors) are claimed to exist in lever fill as well as wire for 1940's pens.

TBOMK all the war-years pens were White Dot pens (save of course for a white-dot-treated, but not actual dotted Masterpiece solid gold... Sheaffer was not yet putting dots into metal).

Post War as noted above... many models, many variants. Masterpiece might've been lever-fill only, but of course remained non-white dot for most of the post-war 1940's.

Valiant ($12.50 fatboy) is claimed for lever filler too, but I've not seen one. Matt thought I'd just won one on ebay as part of a pen lot, but that one is a strange beast, something I will need to post after the holiday. It looks like a Valiant cap-band, is pre-TM Touchdown, but is thinner than other Valiants. Now I need to check if the Touchdown-era 1949-50 Valiant is generally a thinner pen than 1945-8 Valiant, which I doubt but realize I've never checked.

My second and third questions pertain to the Tuckaway. Would it be correct to say that after the introduction of the TRIUMPH in 1942, every model included a Tuckaway variant? After the intro of the TRIUMPH in 1942, were there any lever-filling Tuckaway pens produced, in any line? (I read at Mr. Binder's site that the Tuckaway was initially available only in lever filling version, in solid gold and goldfill finishes.)

Good question, as one might can look at Tucky not as its own series, but rather as the "stubby" version of other, full length pens. That leads to question as to whether it is the stubby version of "some" other models or of "all" other models during the involved era. Answer appears to be that it mirrors some of the other models, not all.

There is no post-war Tucky Masterpiece tbomk. As was pointed out (albeit in a veritable swamp of info) by Matt, some of the bead-band pens have longer and shorter models, but not all the short versions have Tucky clips and not all are called Tuckaway. For some of the post-War pens, the Tucky models essentially are equivalent to longer version (eg. Tucky variants of Sovereign non-bead-band and of Statemsan) but for reasons unknown are not assigned equivalent names (thus, instead of Sovereign Tucky, we have Lady Sheaffer or Lady Tucky or somesuch... i still have not memorized).

Again, sorry for the uninteresting questions. A pointer to a reference would be just as welcome as spoon feeding me the answers.

Dave

Hmmm. You ask questions to which few if any collectors (Daniel still at this point probably being the most facile with this era amongst the online loudmouth contingent, though who knows what knowledge lurks in quiet skulls) have guaranteed answers, which help bring forth info rarely if ever discussed formally, and you apologize for stimulating the chat. Dude, we need to get you some help

Off to the fast now.

Have good weekend.

-d

[djohannsen]

TBOMK all the war-years pens were White Dot pens (save of course for a white-dot-treated, but not actual dotted Masterpiece solid gold... Sheaffer was not yet putting dots into metal).

The article from the 1942 Billboard Magazine that I posted in this thread, says:

W.A. Sheaffer Pen Company is one of the few companies that is still producing low-priced pens but has stopped making pencils altogether because of its munitions production.

From this quote (which certainly is not overly precise), I would have guessed that Sheaffer did continue to produce some non-Lifetime pens... (though probably as a small percentage of their pre-war levels).

Dude, we need to get you some help

If you only knew the depth of my issues...

Thanks for all the information - yet more to try to munch through...

Dave

[matt]

...Valiant ($12.50 fatboy) is claimed for lever filler too, but I've not seen one...

Michael McNeil's got something interesting behind door #3:

http://listarchive.c...ex.cgi?0::39519

That mysterious metal thread ring, too...

and here's a LF Statesman? with a very stripey section, but a shrunken cap:

http://cgi.ebay.com/...em=290476863707

and a LF Crest

http://cgi.ebay.com/...em=160481709526

(added Sept 19) appears to be another Statesman. Nice photography, but poorly posed; who knows where the white dot is...?

http://cgi.ebay.com/...em=250699595993

[david i]

Michael McNeil's got something interesting behind door #3:

http://listarchive.c...ex.cgi?0::39519

That mysterious metal thread ring, too...

and here's a LF Statesman? with a very stripey section, but a shrunken cap:

http://cgi.ebay.com/...em=290476863707

and a LF Crest

http://cgi.ebay.com/...em=160481709526

Mike's looks more as one would expect. The one from ebay is odd. Will post next day or two. Finally to be off for a bit. LF Statesman pens I have sitting about.

d

[Hugh]

Michael McNeil's got something interesting behind door #3:

http://listarchive.c...ex.cgi?0::39519

That mysterious metal thread ring, too...

and here's a LF Statesman? with a very stripey section, but a shrunken cap:

http://cgi.ebay.com/...em=290476863707

and a LF Crest

http://cgi.ebay.com/...em=160481709526

Strange as it may be I've purchased from both those ebay sellers, the last very good, the middle....well...pen had a 14 ct nib....just forgot to mention the words "gold plate" written directly below. This offering looks pretty ordinary.

Regards
Hugh

[J Appleseed]

The article from the 1942 Billboard Magazine that I posted in this thread, says:

W.A. Sheaffer Pen Company is one of the few companies that is still producing low-priced pens but has stopped making pencils altogether because of its munitions production.

From this quote (which certainly is not overly precise), I would have guessed that Sheaffer did continue to produce some non-Lifetime pens... (though probably as a small percentage of their pre-war levels).

1942, or 1943? One does have to remember that 1942 was the first year of serious US involvement in the war. They may have started out with more limited munitions conversion and then converted more of the production line as the war went on. But, of course, there would need to be more documentation.

[djohannsen]

1942, or 1943?

Sorry for the typo... The Billboard article is from 1943. It describes the WPB limiting the pen makers' output to 46% of 1941 levels (with the exception of Eversharp, whose production cap is set as a percentage of their 1942 production).


Dave

[djohannsen]

Another quick question, pertaining to the "Over-The-Top" clipped $10 Valiant Lifetime Feathertouch; $8.75 Vigilant Lifetime Feathertouch; $5 Defender Feathertouch; and the $4 Commandant Streamlined Balance with a #3 nib... Namely, did production of these models continue through the war? One sees advertising (via Google books) for these pens only, more-or-less, until the introduction of the Triumph in 1942. Since these Over-The-Top" clip pens were based on the Balanced(?), did they disappear in 1942, just as the military need sharply ramped up? Or, did production of these pens continue through the war, even though the barrel style was "outdated" (with the military need, I would suspect that, even if production continued, Sheaffer did not need to expend money on national advertising)?


Dave

Edit: I've now seen "Triumph" nibbed pens with the "over-the-top" clip, so this pretty well answers my question.