Roger Cromwell has been repairing vintage fountain pens for many years and is a well known fixture at many pen shows in the U.S. Roger and his partner Victor Chen operate their business Penopoly, specializing in repairs and vintage pen sales.
Roger is a member of the Pan-Pacific Pen Club in Northern California, often lecturing and demonstrating pen repair techniques to his fellow members.

The producers and film crew of Home and Garden TV recently descended upon his shop.
Their goal was to feature Roger Cromwell and Penopoly on their program The Ultimate Collector, which will be shown on U.S. television sometime in April or May.

Roger with his wife wife Beverly and daughter Dani, age 17.

Said Roger, modestly….”Well it was an interesting experience.”
“The film crew spent a grueling 12 hours at the shop, we had about 20 minutes break
all day. The focus was on my adventures in collecting, and how I found
some of the many pens they found very interesting. The other focus of the interview was how this is such a wonderful family hobby, and I must agree.”Many times I will see fathers and sons collecting together at the pen shows.
I always make it a point to help them find something affordable for
the child to make it exciting. Seeing this happen more often lately, leads me to believe the interest in writing instruments and the hobby of pen collecting is growing and also becoming a family adventure.

HGTV is interested to produce a sequel re-enacting some of my more amazing pen
discoveries, that certainly would be fun! I like the fact that they see so much of interest in writing instruments for another program, and that they want to continue with more shows.
I would really think HGTV may be very interested to film at a Pen Show next time, who knows what other surprises they may discover.
HGTV also interviewed my daughter Dani, asking her opinions about writing instruments and pen collecting. She was interviewed under the camera and lights for about
45 minutes, and she was great! I could not believe the maturity of the words that
came from her mouth. For example, they ask her to repeat and answer the
question, "Pens are" and she replied, “…works of art, practical, a great way to
socialize, historical.” She was asked many more questions and her answers made me see how
our children are effected by our actions, WOW!
My Penopoly partner Victor Chen was also present at the filming, but not
filmed because they wanted to focus on this being my family hobby. Victor’s input on that
last question however, was that ”I’ts cheaper than therapy !” Evidently they were quite amused by that reply so it will be used in the filming of the interview.
Overall I would say that this will be a huge boost for the pen
community, as this program is viewed by millions of families.

Roger concluded by stating, “We need many more things like this to speak to the world at
large, not only about pen collecting, but making it a family hobby.
I know there are many others out there with more interesting stories
than mine. We can only hope others would be willing to share their stories
with the rest of us so we may learn and see pens that we would
otherwise never have the chance to observe.

Visit the show’s HGTV Web site for additional information. At least 13 episodes of the series are planned.

www.Penopoly.com
Penopoly is a vintage pen repair and sales facility operated by Roger Cromwell and Victor Chen. Between the two of them, they have repaired and restored pens for over fifteen years.