Novelty Stocking Stuffer

Santa usually leaves a few novelty item stocking stuffers for me, and this recent Christmas was no exception. Included this time was a pencil sharpener - Geppetto's Pencil Sharpener - Made in China but the brainchild of Israeli design studio Monkey Business.

Package, pencil + point protector, and Geppetto.

The weighted base keeps Geppetto smily face up, even with a long nose.

The sharpener works well, although the blade does not appear to be replaceable.

Also in the stocking, not pencil related.... but then again, perhaps it's a little something to help contemplation on future pencil acquisitions?

 

Mitsubishi Novelty Pencils

Germ sent me these ages ago. A bunch of NOS "novelty message" mechanical pencils made by Mutsubishi Pencil, i.e. Uni.

As mechanical pencils they are just lightweight aluminium bodied push top ratchet basic models. Their only branding is the Mitsubishi diamond logo on the body, and on the price sticker. 500 Yen.

There is some corrosion to the chrome plating on some of the pocket clips and tips, so I would guess they are about 15+ years old.

Each has a different message or pattern printed on it in English. They are those sort of messages which don't really sound right to native English speakers. I always assume these sort of things are verbatim translations of the original idea or thought in Japanese, and it just gets lost in translation.

Fantastic Sharp - Pretty flowers are perfumed in your room.

LOVELINESS - She's kind of a friend of mine.

Roller Rule Mechanical Pencil

The Roller Rule Mechanical Pencil or A Different Yard-o-Led Part 2

I recently posted a copy of an old advertisement about a mechanical pencil with an inbuilt measuring wheel. Well that posting jogged the memory of ‘P’ and he commented that his grandfather had one of those pencils. 'P’ then went on a bit of a hunt and found the pencil in question, and sent me these photos and a little more information about it.

P’s grandfather used to use his Roller Rule mechanical pencil to measure road trip distances on a map. P demonstrates and explains here.

The cap rotates with friction against your map. The cap is supposedly 1 inch in circumference, and the cap is calibrated to the 1/8 inch. For each rotation of the cap the ‘head on the shaft’ moves one indicator. And as the advertisement says there are 36 indications, i.e. it can measure up to 36 inches. The shaft has a corkscrew that moves the head.

The lead measures .046 inches in diameter. (That’s 1.18mm in modern speak) Eraser inside the body.

The pocket clip reads, “USA PATD ROLLER RULE.”

Photos and text supplied by, and used with permission of ‘P’.
Thanks 'P'.

Imperial Pocket Knife Pencil

This was auctioned as a ladies pocket knife with mechanical pencil.

The jewellery case appears to be original and has a label "Styled by Fifth Avenue" pasted over the top of the original printing on the satin lining.

A short thin screw action tip feed 0.9mm lead mechanical pencil fits into the knife body as shown.

In the picture above thats a Lamy 2000 for size comparison – it's twice as long.

"Imperial Prov RI" and two patent numbers are stamped into base of the knife blades. Both of the patents were issued to Imperial Knife Co. of Providence, Rhode Island, the first in August 1939 and the second in June 1942, so we know it was manufactured after mid-1942. Wikipedia and other web sources tell me that in 1985 Imperial changed it's name to Imperial Schrade, and the Providence RI factory was closed in 1988. Anyway, these dates combined with the use on 0.9mm lead and it's general appearance make me think this penknife-pencil most likely dates from the 1950's to 1970's. Despite being auctioned as a ladies item, the double blades make think it was most likely intended for a gentleman...but then I don't really know much of what ladies carried in the 1950's and 1960's...any of you readers care to comment?

The events of 9/11 and subsequent restrictions on travelling with pocket knives badly effected Imperial Schrade and they went bankrupt in 2004.

For Mechanical Pencil Nuts

Truly one for mechanical pencil nuts.

A while ago Lee from the Lone Star State sent me these quick snaps of his Mr Planters Peanut mechanical pencil. I had previously seen this pencil on “that auction site” but it’s good to see one in more detail.

Lee doesn’t recall exactly when he got it, but he thinks it was in the late 1980s or early 90s. He purchased a bag of Planters peanuts out of a snack machine at work and saw the offer for the pencil on the back of the bag. Send in two bags and a small fee for shipping and handling and receive a Planters Peanut pencil in return, if he remembers correctly.

Thanks Lee.

Ritepoint Mechanical Pencil

Ritepoint Perpetual Calendar Mechanical Pencil

One thing I like about vintage mechanical pencils is their link to history and how they can take me down paths I would otherwise never have explored. I recently became the owner of this vintage mechanical pencil.

It is a Ritepoint Perpetual Calendar mechanical pencil. I don’t know much about Ritepoint of St. Louis, Missouri, but they were clearly a reasonably large manufacturer who, like Autopoint, made a lot of advertising pencils. A couple of years ago I reverted to wearing an analogue mechanical wristwatch which has only a date display. Formerly I wore digital watches that told me the date and what day of the week it was. Without wanting to sound like some sort of moron or absent minded type of person, when I first got rid of my digital watch I really did struggle with what day of the week it was, let alone being able to tell the time by looking at the hands!!!! I could have done with a perpetual calendar pencil back then.

On the first day of each month you pull the top cap up and rotate it around to set the correct day of the week for the first day of the month, and then you have a calendar set for that month. In the picture above, M (Monday) has been rotated to coincide with the 1st of the month.

This pencil is in near new condition. As you might expect it is a twist tip screw mechanism using 1.18mm leads. The front section pulls off to reveal an eraser.

Whilst it is visually in near new condition, unfortunately a previous owner has tried to refill the lead by jamming them in through the spiral top of the mechanism beneath the eraser, down the sides of the spiral, up through the tip…you name it…wherever you look there’s a lead jammed in there and despite my best efforts I can’t get it to work again.

Now, as for this pencil taking me down an otherwise unknown path…well this is a souvenir pencil, printed with an image of the M/S Batory.

I had not previously heard of the Batory, but a quick Google search reveals she was a ship with an interesting past.

Originally a Polish ocean liner, she saw service as a troop ship with the Allied navies in WWII and her honour role matches that of many a mighty battlewagon - transporting evacuee children from the UK to Australia, British troops to Norway, the BEF from Dunkirk, the UK gold reserves to Canada, landing troops for the invasions of Algeria, Sicily, southern France, and more.

Swank Mechanical Pencil

Here’s an interesting little mini mechanical pencil. It measures 77mm long, (that’s pretty much smack on 3” for non-metric folk), and the body is 5mm square section. It’s a nice shiny golden colour, but no, it’s not gold.

Now you can use it as a pencil, as is…
Or you can pull it out of the body…Looks rather smart with that lined pattern. Quite classy really. I don’t know the correct name for that pattern – perhaps light godron? The eraser is unused but rather old and hardened, and stuck tight in the body. Anyway, the pencil is a tip feed as you would expect from an older 1.18mm screw mechanism mechanical pencil.

Stamped into the body is “SWANK, PAT. PEND.”. That’s the only markings on the pencil. So, a quick bit of internet searching, and now I’m just blithely repeating internet information here, so it could well be rubbish, but apparently Swank is a US jewellery company founded in Massachusetts in 1897. Originally they manufactured and distributed men's and women's costume jewellery and during World War I they made dog tags for the US military. After WWI they changed focus to produce only men's jewellery and accessories. They are still going today, and apparently their products are common in US department stores. (OK, don’t leave me hanging here, nip out to your local mall and confirm or deny this.)

Right, so much for that company history and unpaid advertorial. What exactly is my mechanical pencil? A few vintage and antique dealer websites show this pencil and most describe it as a mechanical pencil tie-clip.


Others say it’s a mechanical pencil money-clip.
Ha! I hope at least some of you appreciate that I had to dig my ties out of storage, and go to the bank especially for those shots - I don’t normally carry any Rutherfords in my wallet. Some unkind people have suggested moths are more likely in my wallet. How rude! The cheek of them! In case you haven’t noticed, most photos in this posting are clickable for hi-res. Yep, revel in the sartorial elegance of those ties.

Now, those sites mentioned above usually state the pencil is marked U.S. PAT. 124227 and some claim known provenance back to the 1940 - 50’s from Granddad. My pencil says “Pat. Pend.” so it presumably predates that. Some sites claim it dates to the early 1900’s. Anyway, however old it is, it’s a nice little novelty pencil and I’m glad to have it.

Palmax Pencil-Knife

Here’s a recent acquisition, an oldie but a goodie. The body is plastic with wood grain colouration, the whole thing being about 12.5cm long, 2cm wide and 1cm thick. I envisage that the target market for this was the gentleman-gamer from the first half of the 20th century.

As well as the pencil tip it features:-

Pen-knife blade, about 4cm long. Nail file and cleaner tip, about 4cm long Entertainment, each about a 1/2cm cube.
There are no markings anywhere except on the base of the pen-knife blade. On one side is “Made in Germany” and on the other is “Palmax, D.R.G.M., Solingen”. So we know it was made in Solingen, the heart of the German knife and cutlery industry. I believe Palmax is the brand, and apparently DRGM stands for "Deutsches Reichsgebrauchsmuster" which means "Utility patent of the 'Deutsches Reich'" and was a German patent and business protection mark from 1891 to WWII.

The pencil is a twist tip screw mechanism as you would expect. As is so often the case with vintage pencils I couldn’t load a new lead because an old one was snapped off inside the lead gripper. So, out with the maintenance kit – torch, magnifier, pin and 1mm drill. Luckily pencil lead isn’t that tough so you can usually easily chip away at and dig out the old stuck piece of lead with a pin or needle. The 1mm drill comes in handy if you have to go digging deep as you can usually drill and crumble the lead out from way inside the mechanism. In the photo you can see a decent chunk of old lead that I dug out of the gripper. I initially assumed this would be a 1.18mm pencil, but a I had a stick of 1.4mm lead handy and it fitted fine. It only takes short lengths of lead.

All that graphite powder over my desk. Some people really are slow learners.

Now the other interesting thing about this pencil-knife is the little glass tube in the centre of the body. At first I thought, hey, wow, some sort of lift out Stanhope lens? Lift it out, stick it right up to your eye and be rewarded with an entertaining scene from yesteryear. Given the gentleman gambler theme, I imagined that the scene would probably be of the “bathing beauty” or “actress in dressing chamber” type as opposed to “idyllic rural countryside”. But alas, the glass tube appears permanently fixed, doesn’t appear to be a lens and I’ve got no idea what it is. It’s hollow, and down one end there are a few little bits that might be residual dried up liquid. A spirit level? Some sort of hourglass timer thing? I am completely flummoxed.