1940s Parker Vacumatic Nib Date Code

[drathbun]

Hi folks!

 

I have a mid-40s Parker Vacumatic Silver Pearl that has a barrel with the imprints very badly worn, so there is no discernable date code.

 

I've pulled the 14k Parker arrow nib and it says "Parker USA" but has an unusual code below that reads '5-1'. The ' might be dots, it is hard to tell.

 

I've included a couple of close-up photos.

 

What does this code mean? Is it a date? The plunger on the Vacumatic pump is plastic, so a date of 1945 seems like it might fit if the '5-1' date code means 1st quarter of 1945.

 

 

[inkstainedruth]

There's a great article on that topic on parkercollector.com.  Also, it looks as if there's a dot after the 1, which normally would tell you in what quarter the pen was produced, so my gut reaction would be 3rd quarter.  Don't remember offhand when they switched between a two digit date code and a 1 digit date code.

From what I remember from the article, though, the date codes were on the barrels.  I don't know if they were also on the nibs.

Ruth Morrisson aka inkstainedruth

[joss]

That is an odd code indeed. A date code on a Vacumatic nib is common but is expected to be a single digit, for 1945 it would be a 5 with zero to three dots. But the symbol next to the 5 on your nib does not look like the font that Parker used for a digit 1. It looks like a vertical line to me. I do not know what is and I do not see anything like this on any of my 1940s Vacumatic nibs.

 

Is the pen itself a Standard size Vacumatic?

[dbhcheung]

I think someone dropped your pen sometime during or after the summer of 51 and had their nib replaced.

[VacNut]

Nibs and fillers are routinely replaced during the life of a pen. If the barrel imprints are worn, the pen very likely was well used. You are likely better off dating the pen based on the Vac Model rather than the nib. At worst case you will only be off by 1-2 years.