, another obscure Waterman’s pen.
It did show up in the following advertisements, though not in any articles that I could find. The American Stationer, Mar 26, 1910, p.39, Apr 2, 1910, p.1, Apr 16, 1910, p.1, May 14, 1910, p.1, and Bookseller & Stationer, May 1910, p.4, June 1910, p.4, and July 1910, p.4. Surely it must have appeared in some issues of The Pen Prophet from that period. It might appear in a Waterman’s catalogue from mid-1910, if one were ever to be found.
It was the 5-month wonder. It came and went even faster than the thimble pen, the sleeve filler, and the pump filler. It wasn’t jointless, though. It had a joint at the barrel tip, which was underneath the cap when the cap was posted, and it probably leaked like the proverbial sieve because it didn’t have the double seal of the A. A. Waterman middle joint pen, thus “insuring an absolutely tight union”. The 1899 A. A. Waterman patent with its “inner union independent of the outer joint” “insured an ink-tight joint”. The joint also had to be “sufficiently removed” from the suction and friction of the slip cap “to avoid disturbance of the joint when the cap [was] being removed or replaced”. The Waterman’s Jointless pen might also have been in conflict with Eagle’s so-called jointless patent pen from 1898, which also had a barrel-end joint.
Now, this is truly a case where “it is not in any official Waterman catalogues, and most significantly, no such pens have, to my knowledge, ever turned up”. At this late stage in the game, there is still some new, obscure stuff out there just waiting to be found.
P.S. Take a look at this other Waterman’s jointless pen.
George Kovalenko.
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