"The visit with Delta Pen was very interesting. I have visited the major companies in Italy and France and I must say I was very impressed with the amount of hand work that goes into the pens. Delta has a small factory, with about 45 or so people working to manufacture the pens."
Left to right: Marco Paracenzo (Novelli Pen in Rome), Glenn Marcus, Ciro Matrone (one of the three owners of Delta Pen), Antonio di Maio (Sales Representative). "No one speaks very much English, and when I wrote Marco and told him I would be going to the factory, he offered to come down from Rome to Naples, to be my translator. He also wanted to see the new factory they moved into last year. I would have been lost without his help. Only so many times you can say ci, benne..."
"Delta is launching a new nib, the "fusion" in the next month. They fuse a gold layer onto a steel layer, and the chemical process creates an extremely good writing nib. They presented me with a Dolcevita piston fill fountain pen, fitted on the spot with the new nib. So I truly have a numbered one of a kind pen. I have been using it to write in my travel journal and I can attest to the smoothness and responsiveness of the nib."
"This is a photo of one of the employees filing down the metal to make the lever for the side-lever ink filling part of a pen. At some of the other pen manufacturers there was much more machine based production of parts. With the Delta pen you are truly getting a hand made pen."
"As I walked about the factory the employees would show me the various pens they were working on. Here they tricked me by showing me again the Pompeii Rediscover."
"When I saw the rods of stunning yellow with black streaks... It was one of those must have pens" [note: as Glenn said in a subsequent email: "I now have it"--see photo below]
"My wife, Karen, bought me the Pompeii Rediscover, for our 25th wedding anniversary. They call it the Rediscover because of what they found out about the colour. The first Pompeii pen was produced in a brick red. That is the colour you see today on the walls of the buildings at Pompeii. But scientists have concluded the walls were actually painted yellow, it was the chemical reaction with the lava and gases that changed the colour to what we see today".
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ [Glenn also wound up with another lovely fountain pen on his trip to Italy:]
Glenn writes: "My other Rome pen is the OMAS vintage 360 in red, just 360 pens made, this is #156. Has a great broad nib and writes like a charm".
[note: Glenn had previously mentioned on his blog that this particular pen was on his "wish list". Glad you finally got it, Glenn...and many thanks for your report from beautiful Italia!]
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