Waterman’s “J” Pens: A Mystery Solved

For over 35 years Waterman collectors have puzzled over an extraordinarily rare model typically described as a slip-cap safety pen, with an end knob of distinctive form imprinted 1XJ (“X” denoting the nib size). Some have guessed that it was some sort of prototype or experiment. Few have given full consideration to how nonsensical a slip-cap safety pen would be.

Although the J-series pens do not appear in any known Waterman catalog, they are mentioned in both company and retailer advertisements and – most helpfully – in a Canadian instruction sheet that I found several years ago. The “J” stands for “jointless” and while the nib retraction mechanism is the same as that found on early Waterman safeties, the nib is only intended to be retracted for filling. Once the pen is filled the nib is extended and left that way until refilling is necessary. 

The first ads that mention Waterman’s Jointless date to the last quarter of 1909. The first that I could find appeared in September with all of the rest appearing in December. Many more followed in the first half of 1910 with only sporadic sightings thereafter. The last Waterman ad that I could find that mentions the Jointless is in the May 29, 1913 Geyer’s Stationer – though it does get a passing mention in 1915 in a published transcript of a Waterman executive’s lecture on sales. There it appears only at the tail end of a recounting of miscellaneous models outside of Waterman’s “active line”, suggesting that it was by then out of production but still in inventory or available on demand (American Stationer, vol. 77, May 22, 1915, p. 30).

Abraham & Strauss ad, Brooklyn Daily Eagle, 18 Oct 1909, p. 8; perhaps a soft launch – a limited test release – as no further mentions are to be found until regular mentions begin two months later.

Bookseller and Stationer (Canada), May 1910, p. 4

Ads and instructions only mention three sizes: 12J, 14J, and 15J. Examples of all three sizes are known, all in black hard rubber – though reportedly at least one in red hard rubber is extant. All examples that I have examined have the early internal mechanism with helical grooves cut into the barrel which make the nib carrier twist as it is extended and retracted. 

This mechanism was adopted by Waterman for their safety pens in 1908 to avoid infringing Peck & O’Meara’s patent 523,234, then held by the Modern Pen Company (A. A. Waterman), and appears to have been used only until that patent’s expiration in July 1911. Whether Jointless production continued after that date is an open question. Perhaps it did, for our instruction sheet also has a spare parts page where for both safety and jointless models “Interior Spirals” are listed – a term that could in no way be applied to the straight-track equivalents used in their  earlier versions.

So what was Waterman thinking? The goal was surely to compete with arch-rival Parker, whose own Jointless had been on the market since c. 1898. Parker’s version required the nib assembly to be pulled out manually from the front of the barrel, a process just as messy as dealing with ink residue at the joint of a conventional dropper-filled pen. Waterman’s version obviated that issue, but at the cost of making the pen as complicated as a safety without the benefits of a safety. And this right at the same time that Waterman brought out its sleeve-filler, a simple design which made filling yet cleaner and more convenient. Perhaps no surprise that the Waterman Jointless was so quickly forgotten.

NOTE: Some extant Jointless pens have unusual protrusions on top of their caps, which in at least some cases are made to be inserted into a matching recess in the turning knob (similar to certain Caw's safety models). I have yet to see any mention or illustration of this feature in contemporary advertisements, however.

Premature latex sac failure and ammonia

For quite a few years now pen collectors have been trying to determine why latex rubber ink sacs fail -- and in particular, why they sometimes fail so quickly. Certain inks have been implicated, and yet efforts to conduct controlled experiments have for the most part not succeeded in producing consistent results and clear conclusions (the exception being highly alkaline inks, which have long been known to attack sacs).

Some time ago I asked my old friend Peter Amis, longtime proprietor of the Pen Sac Company, if he could provide any insight into why newly-made sacs didn't seem to be holding up as well as those made in the 1950s and 1960s, but I never got a clear answer. Peter recently passed away, far too soon -- a huge loss to the pen community. During Peter's illness, Todd Eberspacher stepped in to help keep the Pen Sac Company going, eventually leading to an agreement to take the business over. 

Todd has shared with me much about what he has had to learn about the making of pen sacs. It turns out that environmental and workplace safety issues have led to major changes in how latex pen sacs are made, with the toxic solvents used in the past replaced by water-based solutions. This has affected durability in much the same way as the switch from oil-based to latex house paints. And the new formulations are in part activated by ammonia -- which I am told makes them particularly vulnerable to subsequent ammonia exposure.

The risks ammonia poses to gold nibs has already been documented at length here. That it is also bad for sacs has not been noted previously but should now be accepted as fact. Ammonia-containing pen flush products should not be used on either gold nibs or in pens with latex rubber sacs, including Vacumatic diaphragms. 

A Waterman prototype surprise

Many years ago I acquired a group of prototype Waterman Hundred Year pens, all of first year design but most in colors that never made it into production. Recently I finally got around to cleaning them up for proper photographic documentation, and inside the pen shown above there was an interesting surprise.

There was actually a bit of a clue beforehand -- "LEW" and "X" and "I" scratched into the bottom of the feed. Plus of course the pen's completely nonstandard color, an opaque metallic blue.

Nonetheless, there was no anticipating this. Incidentally, several of the pens in this prototype group came with #7 keyhole-vent nibs. As pre-production examples, they might well have been put together before nibs with the Hundred Year imprint had become available.

And here is a more complete view of the feed. At some point I'll have to look to see if a patent application was filed. 

While some of the pens in this group are pristine, such as the light green metallic example shown above, most had been carried and used, including the blue pen. It was undoubtedly a working prototype and not just a material trial.

Waterman desk set discovery

Inkwells are not a collecting focus for me, particularly those from the 20th century. When this one popped up on eBay, however, I made sure to put in a bid -- and to save photos from the listing, just in case. As things turned out it now resides at my shop. But why my interest in this one?

In large part because it retains its original label, identifying it as the product of the Jennings Brothers Manufacturing Company ("Artware of Distinction") of Bridgeport, Connecticut. 

In larger part, however, because of its clear affiliation with the desk base shown below -- a piece that I don't recall seeing in a catalog or ad, though they are not so rare that I haven't seen a few over the years.

It is widely known that fountain pen makers outsourced all sorts of components, with desk set bases being one of the most obvious examples. Yet we don't always know who actually made what, so this is a particularly fortuitous discovery. Note that the construction is of base metal with a thick gilt bronze surface layer -- well preserved in the inkwell, but with much peeling and losses on the desk base version. The base came with a matching rocker blotter and a set of corner squares to be attached to a desk pad. There surely were other accessories available, though it has been so long since I've seen other ensembles, I no longer recall what other pieces they comprised.

Jennings Brothers also produced a wide range of figurines, often found as bookends. It will be instructive to see how many also appear on catalogued Waterman bases without attribution.

Waterman pens with emblems

  

Back in the later 1990s I bought a collection of Waterman pens with emblems that had been assembled by Jim Krause, an eminent watch, clock, and pen dealer. Most have long since been sold and though I photographed all of them, most of the images were not kept in high resolution form. They are nonetheless a valuable visual record and I am sharing them here, along with some better photos of other Waterman emblems that have passed through my hands more recently.

 

 

 

 

 

Waterman 1919 catalog, p. 49.

1925 Waterman catalog: Reference Library: Waterman – Pen Collectors of America