The Cost of Lost Technology: The Pen Nib
Advisor: Canevaro
Internship Location: Pat Blair Calligraphy
Onsite Mentor: Pat Blair, Former White House Calligrapher, Pat Blair Calligraphy
My name is Kingston Zhang, an avid pen collector and aspiring calligrapher. The research I'll be doing is an analysis of modern pen nibs compared to antique pen nibs, often prescribed as superior in a variety of factors. There is a distinct lack of research into this topic, so I decided to investigate. Much of what I will be doing will be talking with experts in the field, collecting their opinions as well as the opinions of the greater public via polls in public forums. A major company I would love to work with would be the Waterman Pen Co. as they are one of the oldest existing pen manufactures in the world and may have documentation of vintage pen creation techniques. Some major factors I want to consider are the biases for antique pen nibs, pen nib materials, modern demand for fountain pens and dip pens, and viability of production of antique pen nibs in the modern day.
My final product will be a paper detailing the results of my collected data as well as expected production feasibility for modern companies. Through collaborating with pen manufacturers, I hope to gain further insight into the pen making process and the difficulties of introducing features that antique pens had. My hypothesis is that due to lack of demand, pen companies opt for cheaper materials to make inferior products. Additionally automation has decreased quality control for each individual pen nib, thus on average the pen nib has decreased in production quality. I predict that we would be able to make these high quality nibs in the modern day, yet companies do not simply due to the high price point alongside lack of demand.
Project Blog
Week 1: Introduction and Literature Review
Welcome to my first blog post!
My name is Kingston and my project is all about pen nibs, comparing antique and modern calligraphy tools. This week, I spent the majority of my time doing research on the history of nib creation. Thanks to thesteelpen.com, I was able to narrow down points of interest and develop an understanding of how steel nibs came to be around the 1800s. Originally the steel pen nib was a luxury item created by select jewelers and craftsmen as one-off gifts. However, over the years, with rising literacy rates and a developing postal system, it gained popularity in both Europe and the States. Over the next century, automation slowly replaced different aspects of the nib making process, yet most still considered automated nibs to be inferior due to their lack of precision and quality control. Humans were still seen as essential in steps requiring extreme precision such as slitting the nib, as each nib is a little different and machines were less advanced. Overall, The Industrialization of the Steel Pen Trade was an interesting paper that taught me a lot about nib creation.
Of the research that I read, a few points of interest stood out. The first would be the material that companies used. Much of the steel nibs produced were made of Sheffield crucible steel, a quality steel that was slowly pushed out of relevance around World War I. Though there were advantages of Sheffield steel like ease of alloy mixing, costs and newly developed electric furnaces led to a steep decrease in demand. An area of future study could be studying modern metals used today to make nibs and pointing out pros and cons. I've reached out to FountainPenRevolution, a prominent figure in the flex nib industry, in hopes of learning what materials they use to create their modern flex nibs.
Another point of interest is quality control of pen nibs. The Industrialization of the Steel Pen Trade explains an entire process of quality control where each nibs are sorted for defects and individually tested for flex and I wonder if this creates a system in which only the best vintage nibs are allowed onto the market. Modern day machinery does the majority of the work and I would love to discover if they also have a similar quality control check. Quality control is arguably one of the most important parts of the pen nib process as even a millimeter off or a misaligned tine can greatly diminish the writing experience.
Next week, I will continue to explore the articles on thesteelpen.com as it has proved to be helpful in my research process. I will also correspond with companies to further my understanding on the subject and map out the differences.
Thanks for reading my blog and I hope to see you next week!
Kingston Zhang
Week 2: More Historical Context and Current Industry Opinion
Welcome back to my senior blog!
This week I continued to research historical context, focusing more on developments and changes made to the nib over the years.
Development and Improvements of the Nib
Prior to the steel nib, the main writing instrument was the quill, a finely cut feather. Early nibs had a rough time competing but with inventions such as the Three Slit Pen by Williamson in 1806, double spring designs by Phineas in 1853, and a tongue shaped design by Phineas in 1854, they far surpassed even the finest of quills. All of these improved the flexibility and spring of the pen, key components sought after by writers. Even in the modern day, nibs still commonly use the Three Slit Pen design, if not a more elaborate version.
As they matched the writing quality and experience of quills, the only complaint made by consumers were their durability. Especially for writers such as Jefferson who would write for hours a day, corrosive ink proved to be a formidable challenge. Steels, were prone to corrosion and prolonged exposure could decrease a multiyear lifespan nib down to only a half-dozen months. Gold nib pens proved to be a solution to the corrosion, however, gold wore down quickly due to it's softness. It was only in 1834, where Hawkins discovered how to coat the tip gold nibs with iridium, that a solution to both problems was reached. The problem was that this option was only available for the wealthy as gold pens proved expensive.
Market Shifts and Public Influence
Stubs provide an interesting research direction in why modern pen markets largely favor the rigid nib. Although never reaching the popularity of flex nibs or rigid nibs, they did break through the market. In 1871, Esterbrook released the no. 161, the first stub nib on the market. The no. 161 was a rigid rectangular nib that mimicked a flex nib's writing with far less effort. Although not perfectly replicating the fine and intricate lines of a flex pen, the stub was a favorite among writers in a rush who could not afford the time to create fanciful lines or risk sharp points catching the paper. It proved popular within England for a while and provides an example of supply and demand within the pen industry hinting at reasons why flex nibs are no longer produced widely.
Updates and future research
I want to research turned-up tip and oblique pen holders that only tiny sections dedicated to explaining their importance. I've been able to establish contact with FountainPenRevolution. Through some questioning it seems that their company had gone through the same issues as proposed above with flex and durability. The following week, I will try to dig deeper and ask about quality control processes that I mentioned last week alongside contacting more companies for more points of reference.
Thanks for reading my blog!
Kingston Zhang
Week 3: Shortcomings and Paper Review
Hello all! Welcome back to my senior blog.
Although I did want to spend most of this week exploring the history of oblique pen holders and their possible ties to influencing nibs, I could find little on the topic. I will attempt to consul my external advisor and local libraries to see if they have any materials. Instead, I decided to read the MA Thesis of Charles Edward Busby named The Forgotten Fountain Pen: The historical significance of the fountain pen in twentieth-century American society. It was an interesting all around and I learned about how ball point pens replaced fountain pens and how it shaped the current fountain pen market.
The Influence of the Ballpoint Pen
Just as the steel pen was an inferior to the quill at first, the ball point was faulty and seen as an unwieldly replacement. Yet, within a decade of development the Parker Pen Company had released "the Jotter," a ballpoint pen that dispelled much of the skepticism surrounding the mechanical errors of ballpoint pens. Furthermore, pen companies realized that there was no reason to keep the ballpoint pen as a quality, long-lasting writing instrument with the high price tag when it had a long-lasting temporary ink reservoir, thus they slowly become cheap, convenient writing tools fit for the average consumer. Although, the fountain pen and the ball point did write drastically differently, many consumers actually began preferring the ballpoint pen with the decline of cursive in favor of the typewriter for school, business, and governmental environments.
In my opinion, the ballpoint pen affected the nib in two major ways: The direction in which nibs developed and consumer price tolerance. As consumers preferred pens that write more aligned to ballpoints, fountain pens were forced to conform. That is why the majority of the market is dominated by these stiff tip nibs that mimic the writing of a ballpoint pen, albeit with a smoother experience. Flex nibs and their counterparts receive much less attention from the fountain pen community, thus do not receive as many improvements. The second point is what I want to explore more though. The ballpoint pen has brought pen prices down to an astounding degree. Considering that you can buy bic pens nowadays for about 13 cents a pen that last for a year or two each, fountain pens and nib pens in general are dismissed by the general population at large. The paper states that the niche in the market that fountain pens slot into are premium pens above $40 but below $100. This really restricts materials and quality of the pens while still being market viable which may be a major contributing factor to why many deem flex fountain pens of the modern day to be inferior to those of the past.
Thanks for reading my blog!
Kingston Zhang
Week 4: Modern Pen Nibs and Practices
Hello all! Welcome back once again to my senior blog.
This week, I spent most of it looking through sources on modern pen production. Though I was looking for mainly information on flex nibs, it was hard to pinpoint exact information so I just had to settle with production in general.
Pen Production
Interestingly enough, pen production seemingly hasn't changed. A video by described the Samuel Naldi process decently well in my opinion. Though he labeled the video "This is How Gold Fountain Nibs Are Made," I suspect the process for stainless steel involves much of the same steps. Much of the processes seem very similar to factories of the old. First, making and cutting out sheets of pen nibs. Then, imprinting logos and slitting as well as tipping the nib with iridium. Finally, grinding the nib for smoothness and testing for quality control. Of course, I'm simplifying and generalizing to companies and some may not have certain steps like iridium tipping for stainless teel pens or have more steps like hole punching at feed entrances but in general, the processes seem to not have changed much from the 19th and 20th century. Though, it does seem that companies have developed machinery to become more efficient and precise with cutting and tipping which should ensure better writing making my entire project and community opinion seem contradictory.
Quality Control
Speaking of things that we kept around in production, something that surprised me was the amount of human involvement. Much of nib grinding for smoothness and even quality control is still done by humans. Most companies I've read about still employ human workers to ensure nib quality before shipment. It seems that machinery still can't do the work of humans, inspecting and writing with pens to prevent even the most minute details that could negatively impact a writing experience. From a first hand account, Mr. Thiemann, the owner of FountainPenRevolution, personally inspect each Ultra Flex nib for tipping quality and smoothness. From his statement and the apparent strict standard of quality control from pen companies, it led me to wonder why modern pen nibs were deemed inferior to those of the past, especially when we have better technology.
This led me down a rabbit hole in which I found a 2017 podcast named the Nib Section. Although they have plenty of episodes, episode 7 caught my eye named QC Controversies: Nakaya, Visconti, TWSBI. It discussed a strange modern pen company trend of having defects and seemingly lower quality control standards outlining two major companies: Visconti, and TWSBI. Both Visconti and TWSBI are notorious for having iffy quality control and the podcast makes some interesting points into why quality control is diminished. First would probably be the nib type. Rigid nibs, the main base of TWSBI and a large base of Visconti requires a lot less quality control to be passable. The comment by Mr. Thiemann further supports this point where he mostly quality controls the flex nibs which are more prone to errors and faults. The second was the cost aspect. For many companies such as TWSBI, replacing the defective part of the product like the cap cracking was often more cost saving then hiring quality control on a mass scale. Or at least that's the perceived rationale behind the decision. It could also be a result of a topic I covered in a previous post in which companies need to price their pens to be moderately cost which could result in quality complications. Finally, there's the idea that fountain pens are mainly gifts or for people who aren't really invested into writing and small errors on these rigid nibs won't be noticed by the masses. Perhaps it's because only the vocal majority of people who care about their pen quality that modern pen companies have such a bad reputation compared to the vintage nibs. All of these ideas could be factors and I hope to find out if there's a main reason through polling that I hope to start next week!
Thanks for reading my blog!
Week 5: Paper Review and Company Opinion
Hello all! Welcome back to my Senior blog.
This week, I tried reaching out to Waterman Pen Co. after realizing the insight I could gain from reaching out to companies. Although I was ghosted, talking more to Fountain Pen Revolution gave me some interesting questions I would like to ask to original producers of vintage nibs so I'll try to message more companies this week.
Vintage vs. Modern
I think the most interesting development this week happened when I asked Mr. Thiemann about his opinion on vintage nibs compared to his ultra flex nibs. While I expected a biased answer expressing how his pens would feel better in some way, he told me that "It is impossible to compete with some of those old 'wet noodle' nibs." His products are arguably the best on the market, yet even the owner acknowledges the writing quality of the past. Of course, I followed up with questions on what challenges were faced when improving writing quality. He stated that he wasn't really sure what the challenges are either. He phrased it as as a "lost craft" and that the time justification wasn't worth it.
Other developments
Outside of that, I asked Mrs. Blair if she had any resources that was more specific to dip pen nibs and she led me to research speedball history. Although a fun quick read, it seems that the company pivoted hard after the 1940s from developing nibs to anything else. They began acquiring pen, paint, and paper companies, focusing less and less on the dip pen. It shows a trend that less care was put into dip pens after their overtaking by ballpoint pens in 1940s. Clearly it seems that there is a hard monetary incentive aspect to pen nibs and as demand lessened, the craft was slowly lost and the quality diminished.
Week 6: Polling and Results
After posting my survey out to r/fountainpens, I've received 51 responses as of the time I am writing this post. The survey attempted to narrow down some aspects of why users would prefer a style of pen over another, first asking about their preference, then asking for age, reason for preference and writing background. I felt like these questions could limit down some biases such as nostalgia or cultural differences.
Results
Although there was a close to 50/50 split on users preferring rigid nibs over flex nibs, there was almost a 7-1 ratio of those who preferred modern pens over vintage pens with about 20% of people not having a preference. This result shocked me greatly as I presumed that the majority of people that had tried both would prefer the vintage pens. Especially with the amount of praise received online, alongside personal statements acknowledging the superiority by both pen experts I've been working with, I thought vintage pens would have a significant advantage.
Thus, I read through replies for the next questions asking why they chose their pen type. Although I would have loved more detailed answers, many boiled down to convenience of replacement and a stress-free experience. The answer, "I like modern pens because they are generally replaceable if something goes wrong. I can bring them anywhere without worrying too much. Vintage pens have better flex for calligraphy purposes though." really encapsulated the thoughts of many where the writing experience does not outweigh the cons of vintage pens.
Points of Error/Takeaways
I think for the most part, I wasn't specific enough for my polling to really get to the root of the problem I'm trying to address. Many were taking the questions as a whole and focusing less on the pen nib writing experience. Also some of the questions were vague leading to some misinformed answers such as my writing education question not being specific enough and resulting in some people putting their phd or diploma instead of the system of writing they were taught. Otherwise, I do want to try to rerun this polling on a more public scale via social media, but I'll need to refine the questions a lot more and make them more specific to my research.
Thanks for reading my blog!
Weeks 7-8: Paper Writing and Secondary Polling
Hello! Welcome back to my blog. I decided to combine weeks 7 and 8 because most of the work I was doing was the same. Mostly writing in the paper and finding sources to fill in the gap of anything I was missing.
While writing, something that I realized that I wanted to find more out about was the timeline of production for fountain pens. Although many users online claim that there was a large dip in nib pen production around the 1950s, I haven't been able to find many concrete numbers for production sales. I want to try to compile a semblance of a timeline for production numbers with what I can find online alongside what professionals can tell me from their research. I've contacted Mr. Midkiff who has thoroughly researched fountain pen industrialization and he's given me some insights into why pen production dropped drastically in the 1950s. Apparently, "two largest manufacturers of dip pens stopped their production in 1952" and other companies also never recovered the market after the introduction of the ball point pen. I will continue to try to find more data points to extrapolate into a wider world trend but currently, the amount of sources is small.
Otherwise, I'm working with Mrs. Blair, my external advisor to try to set up secondary polling in a local calligraphers guild. I chose to pursue this path because an ad would reach only a fraction of people that have tried both vintage nibs and modern nibs to give an accurate opinion while being costly and most instagram accounts advertising calligraphy are either unrelated to my topic, inactive, or too small for much data at all. After revising my poll, I hope that it will be a more accurate measure of pen nib quality over pen quality as a whole.
Thanks a lot for reading my blog!
Week 9: Metallurgy and Social Norms
Hello welcome back to my blog!
This week, I did more writing for my paper. I mainly explored metallurgy and the differences between metals used in the past and in the present. The main metal used in the past was cast steel, the highest grade of Sheffield crucible steel which was renown for the high purity and quality. From the 1800s to the early 1900s, cast steel was used by most manufacturers, even as more costly and competitive alternatives came out such as steel made by the Bessemer process. The quality was simply ahead of it's time and nothing could quite compete during the time period. However in the 1910s, stainless steel was invented and because of the ease of automation, crucible steel was slowly pushed out of the market. Crucible steel, unfortunately, was made through a delicate process so automation was not possible. Although stainless steel was arguably worse in quality for nibs than cast steel, there were benefits like rust resistance and much cheaper costs so eventually it took over the market leading to the modern day. Pretty much all steel nibs in the modern day are made with stainless steel and crucible steel production is pretty much a lost craft.
Otherwise, I also dove into social conditions of times influencing steel nibs. Flexible nibs were once the golden standard of nibs because the standard writing system were cursive scripts. Alongside for the fact that the previous comparison was to quill pens, it was obvious that most pens at the time would be flexible. Yet in the 1900s, the introduction of ballpoint pens and a new print handwriting system forced fountain pen nibs to become manifold nibs. (rigid nibs) Although there were many reasons why the conversion was forced, I find the most compelling to be that carbon paper was largely implemented around the 1920s and standard flexible nib that would offload copious amounts of inks would bleed and feather onto the paper that was lower in quality in favor of mass production. Manifold nibs did not have as large of an issue with overflowing the paper with ink so manifold became increasingly popular. In the modern day, manifold nibs are the most produced fountain pen nibs now that print has become the standardized and paper quality is in the state it is now. Although dip pens are still largely flexible and did not suffer the same fate of becoming largely manifold, they are impractical in everyday use requiring specialized paper and ink.
Otherwise, I tried contacting local calligrapher guilds and Iampeth in an attempt to do a second round of polling but I was ghosted by pretty much all the organizations so I do not believe a second round of polling will be possible. The data I have right now is passable and I can do some things with it but a future improvement would definitely be to run a more accurate polling of public opinion.
Also I received some nice information from a historian I contacted and they helped with with metallurgy of the past alongside some hints to why modern nibs seem lesser in quality. Apparently quality control has been a lot more lax in certain companies and grinding has been forgone in some cases, an essential component of the nib making process. Furthermore, he gave me the same answer as some other experts in that there simply is just not a market to justify the remaking of vintage nibs in their high quality.
Thanks for reading my blog!
Week 10: Presentation and Final Touches
Hello! Welcome back to presumably my final blog post.
This week I wrapped up everything and just worked on my presentation and paper. Unfortunately, one of my advisors did not get back to me in time for the final paper and the quality control section of my paper is lacking an example, but I feel like the point was still got across on how quality control of steel nibs are lacking today compared to the past. I sorted through most of the data I collected, categorizing responses into the same response if I felt they were redundant in my poll. (eg. stub nib into rigid nib category) Reading through different reasons why more people chose modern nibs over than vintage nibs boiled down to accessibility and convenience. Most still acknowledged that superiority of vintage nibs, so my research wasn't completely in shambles. I do wish I could have conducted another poll with more nib directed questions but considering I'm out of time, unfortunately, that won't be possible.
In terms of the presentation, I did have some problems with clutter considering there was a lot I wanted to talk about but not that much time to do so I had to cut back on a lot of history and nitty gritty things that pushed the pen nib out of relevance. Still, if you're interested Lost Technology: The Pen Nib is just a click away and encompasses most if not all of my research.
Thanks for following my research journey!
Signing off,
Kingston
Week 11: ?: Reflections on the Project
Hello all!
So I lied in my last blog post, and this will most likely be my final blog post. Overall, I had a great time with my project, doing research on a topic I was really interested and curious about. Though there was hardship with finding sources and accurate information, through cold emailing and lots of digging on the internet, I feel like I covered more ground than I ever could have imagined, finding out about things that I had no clue about at the beginning of the project. Learning about different metals and how some metal processes are lost to time was something I definitely didn't expect and I enjoyed it more than I thought I would have.
Polling was lovely and everyone on r/fountainpens was really helpful and nice. Most left a thoughtful comment wishing me good luck with my polling and research. Infact, the entire community as a whole has been really helpful and willing to speak with me for the most part. Cold emailing went way better than I expected and although I was still ghosted a decent amount, most people were responsive and more than willing to help. If I had more time, I wish I did more concise polling and worked with more archives to see if I could find newspaper scraps on the state of nib manufacturing in the 1800s-1900s but sadly, I ran out of time. I also had a point of interest I wanted to talk to Andrew Midkiff about and even though my project is over, I feel I will continue corresponding with him because he does bring up some interesting points.
Anyways, thank you so much for reading my blog posts and being a part of my journey. And I would like to give a special thanks to my internal advisor Ms. Canevaro for being extremely helpful with ideas and paper writing and my external advisor Pat Blair who helped me find lots of information on dip pens and provide some physical book information that was helpful with pinpointing research topics.