Today's spotlight is on a vintage pen recently acquired by Christopher, made by a pen company celebrating the 125th anniversary of its founding this year. The pen's lovely reddish-orange colour is very Autumn-like, so I thought it was a good time to feature it :)
Christopher writes:
"Sometimes, a vintage fountain pen comes your way
that is too good not to be addressed, and yet has you scratching your
head as to how to make it acceptable. Such was the case with a quite
large Conklin Oversized, mid twenties ‘Extra Long Endura. This pen
caught my eye almost immediately. Finished in the most exquisite
brilliant red/orange hard vulcanized rubber, about the only thing which
it didn’t have going for it was its clip. And rather sadly, a chip on
the open end of its cap. Still, with the rest of the pen in just superb
condition, I was hard pressed to pass it up."
(photo courtesy of Christopher ~ please click on image to enlarge)
"With
this pen in hand, almost the entire focus revolved around the cap and
what to do with it. Fortunately, I did have just the right replacement
clip in my spares. But on closer examination, with a twenty times loupe, I
noticed a very unsettling hairline crack extending up from the clip
mounting hole about three quarters of a centimeter and on the bottom of
this hole, a full centimeter down toward the open end of the cap.
Granted, it was hardly noticeable with the naked eye, but still just
knowing it was there bothered me. Over and above replacing the cap which,
due to its rarity could prove to be a challenge, I did have quite a
nice Mercantile accommodation clip, Circa 1910 which when applied, drew
the crack tightly together and at the same time completely covered it. Once
on the cap, it just seemed to solve that problem nicely. Now for chip at
the bottom, open end of the cap. For dealing with this short, I had a
beautiful and quite wide 14K Gold filled jeweler’s band, which just fit
perfectly and totally covered the chip and at the same time, curled
under and into the open end of the cap offering full protection. With
these two items addressed, I was ready to restore and service the pen.
I won’t get into details regarding the restoration and servicing to follow, since it was basically what one has to do with a vintage lever filler to bring it up to scratch. Instead, I will describe the make up of this terrific old trooper, as a very large semi flat top, with a the top of its cap smoothed and rounded down around the edges. This cap top is also chased deeply with a circular line, which is also repeated near the bottom the barrel and at the upper end of the barrel to equal quite an attractive overall design. Also, near the bottom of the barrel, is a rather short but effective lever for filling the pen. Which may I add, draws a substantial amount of ink when filling. I would be well off the mark not to mention that this pen posted, measures a lengthy 7 inches, but caps back to 5 ¼ inches. Still, I should put more of a focus on the huge and brilliant 14K Gold ‘Conklin, Toledo engraved nib. This business part of the pen, is well tipped and a medium flexy writer providing a generous amount of ink on paper. The feed that this nib sits on is equally well made and impressive. Both of these important elements sit responsibly into a more than adequate grip section, which provides for very comfortable writing. In closing, the Conklin Endura throughout its existence was, and still is not, an inexpensive proposition but, in this particular case, a vintage writing instrument well worth having."
Our thanks to Christopher for sharing this handsome vintage pen with us!
Wishing everyone a safe and happy Thanksgiving long weekend,
~Maja
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