Odd Little Ring Top - What is it?

[Phthalo]

Hi folks,

 

I found this cute little cartridge-filling Sheaffer ring top, and thought it would be a good pen to take to work. (I don't like taking my vintage ring tops out of the house in case I lose or damage one.)

 

Anyway, I figure it's from the 70's, but I can't find any information indicating a model name or year. Is it a No-Nonsense?

 

Any thoughts?

[antoniosz]

Yes it is a no-nonsense pen.

Very cool/cute pen

And yes, there are white-dot No-Nonsense apparently from late 60's early 70s.

 

Have a look at this photo from Sheaffer's factory:

https://www.pendemonium.com/photos/sheaffer...%20floor_7.html

Edited September 11, 2006 by antoniosz

[Phthalo]

Cool - thanks for the help! That's what had me stumped - I didn't think the No-Nonsense had the white-dot, but then I couldn't figure out what else it could be.

 

It is pretty cute, and I love the colour - it has a nice old radite 3-25 look about it.

[Univer]

Hi,

 

Actually, it's not a No Nonsense. This is one of the "Doll" pens from the 70s; it was part of the "Guys & Dolls" line, including clip pens (for the Guy) as well as ringtops (for the Doll). They were sold in glass "test tube" packaging, with labels featuring groovy 70s graphics.

 

I've got one in a darker pseudo-Rubic orange as well as the lighter orange, and in lime green as well. Please see the attached photo.

 

One unfortunate side-effect of the packaging is that some pens are now light-faded. The lighter orange in the photo is uniformly faded except for the area covered by the cap (the pen was originally posted in the packaging).

 

They're cool pens. I especially like the thicker plastic (another point of difference from the No Nonsense pens) and the short, retro-design section (that section won't interchange with a No Nonsense section, by the way).

 

Best,

 

Jon

Edited September 11, 2006 by Univer

[Phthalo]

Univer: How bizarre, I've never seen anything like those Guy-Doll pens! What are the dimensions? Are they much different to a No-Nonsense in size?

[Univer]

Hi Phthalo,

 

Unfortunately, I'm at my office now, so I can't do any measuring. But I feel confident in saying that the overall dimensions are very close to the No Nonsense.

 

I think the "Guys & Dolls" line was a worthy (and maybe underappreciated) effort to reinterpret classic flattop design. In marketing terms, the "Guys & Dolls" theme makes sense: it establishes a link to the 1920s/30s era, courtesy of the musical of the same name, and it neatly divides the line into men's and women's models. The design details are good: the above-mentioned short section (a dead ringer for a 1920s flattop section); the thicker plastic, definitely more "Radite-like" than the plastic used for the No Nonsense pens; the cap vent holes (missing from the No Nonsense); and, of course, the white dot. The clip, if memory serves, is plain; a "Sheaffer'S" engraving would have been a nice touch. The trendy colors add a welcome contemporary note.

 

To my mind, these are more successful evocations of the 1920s flattop than either the No Nonsense Vintage or the No Nonsense Old Timer.

 

If you check out the lots of Sheaffer magazine ads that turn up on eBay, you may find an ad for the "Guys & Dolls" series. I've seen them, but I don't happen to have one.

 

Seems to me I once came across a reference to some talented soul turning one of these into a lever filler. Certainly an ambitious undertaking, but an interesting idea.

 

Time permitting, I'll post some dimensions, etc. tonight.

 

Cheers,

 

Jon

 

PS I'm not clear on the timeline - would this have been a response to the Parker "Big Red" revival?

[Roger W.]

Univer;

 

Thanks, I couldn't remember it for the life of me - I kept coming up with "pen for the girl" but knew that wasn't it. When I first saw these several years ago I thought they might be vintage but, I later saw an auction with the full packaging. They have a great vintage look.

 

Roger

[Univer]

Thanks, Roger!

 

I also had a bout of confusion when I first saw one of these; I actually thought it might be some kind of Frankenpen cobbled together out of new and vintage parts.

 

I wonder...does anybody happen to know the complete color range? A black "Guy" pen would be a perfect neo-vintage pen (but maybe the sobriety of black would have been at odds with the 70s spirit).

 

And I should have mentioned: these are also terrific writers. The nib, at least, is definitely a No Nonsense derivative (gold-plated and engraved, oddly, with the letter "V"). Like most No Nonsense nibs, it writes about a hundred percent better than you might expect. (I'm doing some editing at work right now, writing with a translucent orange "Jelly" NN, filled with Noodler's Hunter Green; and it really is a pleasure to use.)

 

Cheers,

 

Jon

Edited September 11, 2006 by Univer

[antoniosz]

Hi Jon, thanks for the clarification. I thought that these pens the white dot "NNS-like" and the ringtop where NNS, but I stand corrected.

I have the lime green pen which I posted about at Pentrace last year and the "consensus" was that it was an "early NNS".

We even talked about it here (scroll down) Now I know that it is "for the guy" (FTG?)

http://i22.photobucket.com/albums/b325/azavalia/limeNNS1.jpg

http://i22.photobucket.com/albums/b325/azavalia/limeNNS2.jpg

http://i22.photobucket.com/albums/b325/azavalia/limeNNS3.jpg

Edited February 11, 2007 by antoniosz

[Univer]

Hey antoniosz,

 

Thanks for the link to that thread. I'm always happy to hear people praising the good old NN. I'm very fond of the chrome-top cartridge pen, too. Honestly, I don't think anyone ever built a better entry-level pen than Sheaffer.

 

FTG? Works for me. Pretty funny, when you think about it: Sheaffer made both the Pen For Men and the pen For The Guy.

 

Cheers,

 

Jon

[Phthalo]

Thanks very much for the info Jon! As you noted the design detail makes it a little special - a cool pen indeed, I'm really looking forward to it!

Edited September 11, 2006 by Phthalo

[Taki]

Those are really cool pens, Phthalo, Jon, and Antonios. I really like the ringtops

[Univer]

Hi All,

 

Just to follow up: the FTG/FTD pens are slightly larger - in all dimensions I measured - than the NN pens. The cap and barrel seem to be about 1/16" wider, and the capped pen seems to be about 1/4" longer (~5 1/8" for the NN versus ~5 1/4" for the FTG/FTD).

 

Please regard all of these measurements as approximations only. I made them late last night using my trusty 1960s hardware-store-advertising ruler.

 

These pens do turn up on eBay from time to time. In fact (and this is something I've noticed about eBay generally), they sometimes seem to turn up in clusters: three or four over a couple of weeks. Sometimes sellers describe them as "doll pens," which makes them sound like miniatures.

 

Cheers,

 

Jon

[Phthalo]

Thanks Jon - nice news about the dimensions and the 'bay... I'd like another!

[Maja]

Thanks so much for all the info, Univer! I have several NN pens and wasn't aware of the "Guys & Dolls" line. I clearly remember Antonios' previous posts on his unusual lime-green pen, so it's nice to know that the mystery has been solved, once and for all

Edited September 12, 2006 by Maja

[antoniosz]

Here is a reference to an ad (see here that is claimed to be from 1970. The colors were Lime-alive, Turn-on-red, and Fired-up-orange. Look how the guy wears his Sheaffer :roflmho:

Edited February 13, 2007 by antoniosz

[Phthalo]

Oh yeah - he's cool.

 

That wording of that entire advert is just hilarious...

 

I don't know if I should be taking a pen to work in such a colour as "Turned-on Orange"!

[Elaine]

Turn-on-red, and Fired-up-orange. Look how the guy wears his Sheaffer :roflmho:

Must be the same ad man that now works for Verve.

[2GreyCats]

Hey antoniosz,

 

Thanks for the link to that thread. I'm always happy to hear people praising the good old NN. I'm very fond of the chrome-top cartridge pen, too. Honestly, I don't think anyone ever built a better entry-level pen than Sheaffer.

 

Cheers,

 

Jon

I like to see that too -- I love both the NNs and the chrome-tops, also. Yes, I know, there's nothing "special" or fancy about them, and they're the FP equivalent of Kraft Mac & cheese dinner -- but I grew up using them, they're the first FPs I ever had, and I never used one I didn't like (well except for the one translucent red cartridge-pen that always drooled on me...).

 

And, I just pounced on an auction for a dark-green solid color chrome-top cartridge pen, because I always wanted one that color as a kid, and never had one.