The Monday Ritual

It's Monday morning, and I've just completed a ritual that has been part of my weekly routine since January 2019. I've refilled my Parker 51 fountain pen. 

It didn't need refilling, even though I do use it several times daily, adding things to my twice-weekly shopping list, or simply making casual notes on a notepad. Using a pen still makes sense for temporary and disposable notes, and there's always the odd birthday card to deal with of course. Or for making purchase notes in books, or on the back of paintings that come into my possession.

Admittedly, any kind of pen would do for such things; but I like the feel of a fountain pen, the mark it makes on paper, and the extra style it brings. 

So it's worth the effort of filling it once a week. I am perfectly happy to put up with any slight inconvenience, and I don't mind all the care and attention this well-made but nevertheless delicate writing instrument requires. It can be accidentally damaged quite easily. Neglect can lead to its clogging up with dried-up ink. Indeed, using the wrong kind of ink will kill it (what ink to use is a deep subject all on its own). So I stick to the 'official' Parker Quink ink, and keep that fresh by weekly refilling, in the process flushing out its internal tubes and fins. 

As to the 'ritual', I take off the cap, unscrew the barrel, dip the nib end into the ink bottle, and press a metal bar slowly four times. Then I withdraw the pen from the bottle, and with a tissue or piece of kitchen roll carefully wipe excess ink off the nib and the area around it. Then I put the pen together again. I do this every Monday morning, without fail, at home or on holiday. Every Monday since January 2019. It's a satisfying little task that I like doing, and I'm keeping my fountain pen healthy with the weekly frequency.

I could easily get away with, say, a fortnightly refill. My pen's internal ink reservoir is large, and it would take an awful lot of writing to run it dry. It was designed to cope with a full day of handwriting -  long screeds of it - the kind of usage common in schools, colleges and offices before ballpoint pens were invented and became totally reliable and prestigious in their own right. An era when a pencil was the only other kind of writing instrument. It was all long before the computer age. 

People didn't mind messing about with ink bottles (and it could be very messy!) when there was no alternative. Even if you could type, nobody typed a personal letter: it was always handwritten, as a minimum courtesy to the receiver. Love letters especially - any sort of billet doux - required the personal touch of a fountain pen. When growing up I was always impressed by a card or letter written with a 'proper pen', and felt second-rate if the writer had written me off with a ballpoint. So using a fountain pen had a social significance that even today hasn't entirely evaporated.  

Of course, Parker - and other pen manufacturers - invented various ways to add style and convenience to refilling a pen, and make the procedure good for the Jet Age. I came across this ad from 1957, showing a sophisticated cocktail-drinking man-of-the-world (is he a famous actor?) watching his new Parker 61 fountain pen - placed backwards into a bottle - automatically suck up the ink. The first 61s contained an absorbent core of special material that drew the ink inside without the owner having to press anything - so there was much less potential for getting inky fingers. Look at the thoughtful fascination on his face. 

Message: real men buy Parker pens, and get a kick from the latest capillary refilling method - not just from champagne! 

That version of the Parker 61 wasn't a success, as the capillary action gradually became inefficient. Later 61s reverted to conventional filling methods. And not far ahead was the era of disposable plastic cartridges prefilled with ink, a student's dream. I never used those. Even when young, I preferred the ink-bottle ritual. Partly because I liked the smell of the ink, and still do.

Production of the Parker 51, a pen conceived immediately before the Second World War and perfected afterwards, didn't cease when the 61 was launched. The 51 was a best-seller and had a very long life, going though a number of design phases right through to the 1970s, all well documented and which help to date any pen that one might buy nowadays. 

I had to learn all about various little functional and styling changes in order to be quite certain that mine was indeed wholly original, and not merely a 'frankenpen' - that is, a credible-looking fake put together from pen parts of various ages. A single indication of age wasn't adequate. Everything had to belong together, with no ifs and buts. 

One of the more conclusive age-indicators - if it survives, as it might rub away over many years - is a tiny date mark on the barrel that (provided it is truly contemporary with the rest of the pen) precisely records in which quarter of which year one's pen was manufactured. My pen has such a mark. It's the 'dot 5' visible just below the metal ring in the shot below. 

'5' meant '1955', and the single dot to the left meant 'third quarter'. Parker made a fresh metal stamp annually for impressing the plastic with a manufacturing date. The first quarter of the year would show three dots, then they'd file off a dot for the second quarter, leaving two dots. Then for the third quarter another dot would be removed, leaving only a single dot. That last dot would then be removed to indicate the final quarter. So if there are no dots, you know it was a pen manufactured with the Christmas market in mind. By 1955 only the Newhaven factory was date-marking in this way.  

I didn't see this 'dot 5' at first, and the dealer probably didn't spot it either. It was rather faint.

Thus my own Parker 51, made at Parker's former UK factory in Newhaven in Sussex, dates from the 'third quarter of 1955'. In other words, it was made in July, August or September 1955. It's rather a shock to realise that this object - which looks modern, and is in daily use - is actually sixty-eight years old. Not many things last this long! It's only three years younger than myself. Of my personal possessions, only Teddy Tinkoes, my teddy bear, and a silver serviette-ring, are older. So my Parker 51 (named Water Dragon) is by its age alone very special to me. 

But otherwise it's simply a good example of a fountain pen produced in its millions, although acknowledged to be one of the best designs ever. There are plenty still around to buy - all of them pre-owned of course. I fancy the 'old fountain pen' market remains healthy and has had a modest revival in recent years, retro stuff in general being in vogue as a reaction to soulless all-electronic gadgetry. Certainly, prices have gone up significantly since I bought my pen online in 2019 for £125. A very similar one in the same colour on the same website is presently being offered at £175 - that's a 40% increase in four years.

Here in fact are screenshots of my pen on that website (Vintage Pens of Hornsea in East Yorkshire) just before I decided to buy:

No doubt even a proper dealer hasn't the time to do very detailed research on all the pens that pass through his hands. He was wrong about the 'mid-sixties' date for mine, although it was pleasant to play the girl detective, do the footwork, and successfully establish for myself an unmistakable list of indications that proved its true date of manufacture. Anyway I bought this one, and have been its proud owner ever since. 

On receipt I had the ink bottle ready! This was it in the shop.

I had only to put ink into the pen. It had been serviced by the dealer - the pen dismantled; the rubber ink sac replaced; the nib adjusted; and the pen flushed out with water. So there should have been no functional issues whatever, and there were none.

I soon made a new pen case from leather offcuts. I wanted very good protection for my new treasure.

Filling time!

If that looks like a set-up full of potential disaster - ink bottle tipping over, pen dropped onto the floor and nib terminally bent - bear in mind that I usually fill Water Dragon before breakfast and not long after waking, so that I'm still half-asleep. There have been no mishaps yet, after more than two hundred fillings. So it can't really be the exacting performance you might think. I'm saying that if you need a proper retro start to your week, a fix of reality, few activities beat filling a fountain pen. 

Go to it.