What Pen started your life long love of fountain pens?

[Tournevis]

A cheap Stypen and a Parker Vector (love) in 1987.

[AlexLeGrande]

A $1.95 Sheaffer cartridge pen with a broad italic nib. I still love the those thick and thin lines produced by my inexpensive, yet smooth flowing and writing, Pilot 78G.

[marsos52]

a bexley b701 it was calling me still have it still use it still love it

[artaddict]

A navy blue Parker Vector, F. I still have the nib & cap; the barrel broke.

[Deirdre]

I believe it was the Aurora Mare.

[Tojusi]

I was in senior high school (early 90s). I saw an advertisement for Parker Vector stainless steel (brushed). I was sold. I received it as a birthday present, medium tip. I still have it - and use it from time to time.

 

/Tojusi

[Rufus]

I know I'll be dating myself when I tell you this but here goes: In primary school we could only use dip pens, which we dipped into inkwells on in our desktops (would you believe?); the ink was made up everyday from powder by our teacher and poured into our inkwells from a can with a spout by one of the boys. Upon moving up to secondary school, we graduated to fountain pens and I acquired my first one in 1960, a blue Esterbrook J double jewel. I used this pen for about a year and a half at which time I "moved up" to a Parker 21 Super, which I still have and use today. I used the Parker 21 all through secondary school and university and at work. This is the pen that did it for me. Since then I have acquired and retained two dozen other fountain pens including four Estie J double jewels. My Parker 21 continues to perform flawlessly after forty-five years and one new sac. The only problem I've had is with the hood plastic which has deteriorated around the nib and looks to have shrunk; I've replaced it once and it looks as though it needs to be replaced again. Although I have gone to the "darkside" on a few occasions and put away my FPs in favour of ballpoints/biros/rollerballs, I've always come back to my FPs in short order. I much prefer the feel of writing with an FP over a BP/RB and find that my handwriting is much better. In part this could be due the conditioning we received at school that BPs were degenerate and that sons of gentlemen only used FPs (by the way I did not go to school in Canada or the US).

[purpledog]

Sheaffer Prelude.

[flexynib]

When I was in high school I used Sheaffer cartridge pens from the drug store off and on. In the early 80's I got a Pelikan 120. The Pelikan hooked me into using fountain pens. I used it until the early 90's when it suffered a tragic death. I still have the pieces.

Now, I use vintage pens with most of them being Sheaffers from the 30's and 40's.

Mary

[Univer]

A Sheaffer Cartridge Pen: translucent red, chrome cap, conical ends. Bought new at the dear departed Five-and-Dime back in the early 60s. It's still in fine condition, and I still enjoy writing with it from time to time. As the Alpha Pen, it occupies a privileged place among all of its rarer, costlier brethren.

[haywoody]

A Charcoal Lamy Safari that I purchased at my university (go Hokies!) bookstore around 1990. I still use it and it is BEAT!... still writes great though.

 

I posted a picture of the poor thing here.

 

/Woody

[yachtsilverswan]

My Montblanc 149 instantly cured my writers' cramp in college - 10 pages of notes for a one hour chemistry class (Go Heels!). That same 149 is still in my small stable. I still love it; and it still loves me.

Edited January 9, 2008 by yachtsilverswan

[bsaint]

A $5 Sheaffer from a drug store. But I didn't really start liking the way they wrote until I bought Diplomat from Staples as well. I guess these guys are really popular. I only know to get refills for it from the crafts store.

[ebwatt]

About 25 years ago, (I was 2 at the time) I started to notice the differences between European and American product design. One of the most dramatic differences was between German and American products. I received a Eltron shaver, and was blown away by its black, minimalist look. This was as compared to Reminington Shavers at the time that were chrome and didnt seem to have any cohesive style.

I have a heavy beard (I know I'm rambling), and back then, I had a tendency to go through shavers (I use a double edge now-rambling again).

With my second Eltron or Braun shaver, there was an offer to get a Lamy Rollerball pen. I had no idea was Lamy was, or was a rollerball was for that matter. Back then, they made quite a few pens that were in the $5 range. Once I got it I was hooked. I continued to purchase cheapie Lamys until one day I was in the local Service Merchandise (Out of business now I think).

There they had a Pelikan m200 FP and ballpoint set on sale ( they are marked W. Germany so that gives you an idea of the age). I had only heard of Montblanc at that point, and thought this must be a cheap knockoff.

 

I have them to this day..

 

Doug,

 

You must have matured quickly. I didn't start shaving until I was 14 :-P

 

Eb

 

I guess I should answer the question too.

 

I've enjoyed the IDEA of fountain pens ever since a friend of mine introduced me to buying vintage pens on ebay. I bought a few, both new and used, and it was the cheapest of the lot that let me know I was in for life - a black Parker '45' with a viscious scratch running down the side of the barrel. It is still my go-to pen for creative writing. However, because it's so small I'm looking for a replacement that is a better fit for my hand.

 

Eb

[fpfanatic5]

Parker Reflex from The Paper Store in 7th grade.

[kkbach]

At the age of 15 my father passed along his Pelikan 101N - I was hooked.

[brh]

When I was really young, I went to an air show with my father, and aside from there being a lot of planes, there were a lot of vendors selling all sorts of things. Some of these were lower profile (selling old army surplus stuff, flashlights, &c.) and some were higher up (insurance and the like). A lot of the places selling expensive services gave out little trinkets in addition to business cards. I liked these places a lot because I collected business cards, and pens (just the cheap promotional type - but some were really interesting for a kid). So one place handed out a disposable FP. I have no idea who made the FP, but I loved it until it ran out of ink. This was partly accelerated by my best friend flicking it violently so that it sprayed ink all over me. I reciprocated. That's not responsible 'penmanship!' But anyhow, that was the pen that did it, and then I got a Parker Vector (I believe? The cheapest one they make, I got it at CVS) and that served me well in school until the plastic barrel cracked.

 

And it all went downhill from there.....

 

-brian

[FrankB]

I have told this story so many times people here are probably tired of hearing it. I learned to write with a dip FP in school in the fall of 1958. My dad said that if I did well, he had a gift for me. He appreciated my progress in penmanship, so he gave me a Parker 51. It was one he was not using, but it was a "real" friggin' pen to me. It had/has a sharp but wet accountant nib that accomodates the smallest handwriting that I am capable of.

 

As I indicated, I still have and love that pen. It is a vac filler and I have never done anything to it except to keep it clean.

 

Fortunately for me, I have that pen and I was always able to contrast any and all BP's to it. As I watched our Western society degenerate into BP use, I stayed loyal to FP's. Never, ever, not in the proverbial million years, did I expect that I would be relating this story on something called the Internet to a group of FP enthusiasts 50 years after the fact.

[Doug Add]

The pen that started it all for me was not a fountain pen. I received a Waterman Phileas rollerball as a gift a little over ten years ago, and realized that pens could be more than utilitarian, they could actually be aesthetically pleasing. I asked my friend where he got the pen and he gave me a Levenger catalog. As I browsed through it I began to wonder what it would be like to own a nice fountain pen. My wife thought I was crazy because she had used cheap fountain pens in elementary school and had a fairly low opinion of them.

 

My first fountain pen purchase was two days after Christmas 1997. I went to the local luggage store, which carried fountain pens, and they were selling all Parker pens at 50% of retail. I got a firedance red Sonnet and a pearl and black international size Duofold.

 

The Sonnet was sold about three years later. The Duofold was traded a couple years later for a jasper centennial size Duofold, which was swapped for a lapis centennial size Duofold after about five months. Six months later I sold the lapis Duofold for $5 less than I paid for the original pearl and black. Not bad in my opinion: a $5 investment for the use of three fine pens over a period of four and a half years!

 

Those first Parkers may have gone on to other users, but a beautiful blue pen caught my eye that day back in December 1997--a sapphire Namiki Impressions, but it was way out of my price range. I was fortunate enough to get a slightly used one about three years later, and it has been one of my favorite pens since, having been continually filled with Aurora Blue ink for over seven years now.

 

Oh, and I do still have and use the Phileas rollerball that started it all.

[Paddler]

Fifth grade in 1956, the nuns threw all the dip pens and inkwells over the side and made everybody buy a Sheaffer school pen. Everybody got a colorless one, but none were imprinted "demonstrator." I used mine for many years. I still have it and still use it. The chrome is beginning to wear off of the cap and the brass shows through in places. It still works well.

 

Paddler