Interesting pen with an interesting story

[Saturninus]

I have no affiliation with this buyer, although I am a very satisfied customer (and I think many of us here are). I check his auctions pretty much every day, and this afternoon I noticed this:

 

interesting pen

 

Neato. I am interested to see how much it goes for...

Edited July 26, 2009 by Saturninus

[AltecGreen]

I have no affiliation with this buyer, although I am a very satisfied customer (and I think many of us here are). I check his auctions pretty much every day, and this afternoon I noticed this:

 

interesting pen

 

Neato. I am interested to see how much it goes for...

 

 

He seems to several of these pens. There is one in green closing tomorrow. This is an interesting story at least from a sales perspective. The pens look pretty nice and it does appear to have a lot of hand work. I wonder if the nib is handmade or outsourced.

 

I'm also curious how much this goes for.

[hari317]

I'm also curious how much this goes for.

 

Two of these pens have been sold by him, I could locate one ended auction to give an idea of the ended price:

 

Auction 1

 

NAYY,

 

Best,

Hari

 

[stan]

Kato Seisakusho (His company name) sold the pens in a number of shops and they used to show up regularly at Yahoo Japan Auctions. The ones at YJA came with gold plated and gold nibs and were priced accordingly. I recall starting prices of Y8900 and Y12900, respectively. I've been able to obtain a few for resale, two of which had manufacring problems. They are available onlline in Japan here or here.

 

Abouut seven or eight years ago he made a very limited edition of supposedly hand carved celluloid pens modelled somewhat on 1920s style caps and barrels. I made an extensive effort to acquire one going so far as to contact his distributor in Japan. Unfortunately, they were sold out and I have not heard of any offered for sale since that time.

 

The story of Mr. Kato is pure fantasy. Making pens in Egypt? During World War II? Get real! The photograph of him working is lifted from another site. For a very short time, he did make celluloid for Visconti. That is true. The rest is hype. He even splled the name wrong. It is Kiyoshi Kato.

 

Two years ago a number were for sale on FPN here.

[hari317]

The story of Mr. Kato is pure fantasy. Making pens in Egypt? During World War II? Get real! The photograph of him working is lifted from another site. For a very short time, he did make celluloid for Visconti. That is true. The rest is hype. He even splled the name wrong. It is Kiyoshi Kato.

 

Thanks Stan for the details, I was intrigued when I saw the first listing by Taizo a few weeks back.

 

Regards,

Hari

 

[Dr.Grace]

Here's another version of the story (scroll down past the Nakaya info):

Kato Seisakusho

 

I bought a couple of these pens a while ago from a Japanese store, but sold them later on FPN.

[pixwriter]

Kato Seisakusho (His company name) sold the pens in a number of shops and they used to show up regularly at Yahoo Japan Auctions. The ones at YJA came with gold plated and gold nibs and were priced accordingly. I recall starting prices of Y8900 and Y12900, respectively. I've been able to obtain a few for resale, two of which had manufacring problems. They are available onlline in Japan here or here.

 

Abouut seven or eight years ago he made a very limited edition of supposedly hand carved celluloid pens modelled somewhat on 1920s style caps and barrels. I made an extensive effort to acquire one going so far as to contact his distributor in Japan. Unfortunately, they were sold out and I have not heard of any offered for sale since that time.

 

The story of Mr. Kato is pure fantasy. Making pens in Egypt? During World War II? Get real! The photograph of him working is lifted from another site. For a very short time, he did make celluloid for Visconti. That is true. The rest is hype. He even splled the name wrong. It is Kiyoshi Kato.

 

Two years ago a number were for sale on FPN here.

 

thanks for the information, I love the translucent mother of pearl irridescent finish on the first pen in the second online sale site you give. Any ideas on the material and the availability of other pens in that finish?

[diplomat]

The story is rather confusing, but if they are claiming that the Visconti Manhattan and Ragtime were made during WWII... well it takes just a trip to the Visconti website to find out that Visconti was established in 1989...

 

From the auction text:

"During the World War 2, katosan travelled to Europe to sell his handmade fountain pens. I was taken a back when he told me that, he is the maker and art behind the famous “Visconti- Manhattan and Ragtime” fountain pen. We all know these fountain pens but nobody knows the maker and the art."