WEDNESDAY –The Sport of Pens begins
You know you're nuts about pens, or just plain nuts... when a weekend pen show starts on Wednesday.
The 2003 Pen Show starts for me by picking up my friend Miroslav Tischler, author of the Penkala book, at the airport arriving from Zagreb, Croatia. This is his first visit to Chicago, and he is very excited.
The hotel is five minutes from the airport, and I quickly got him settled in then met Steve and Maryann Zucker in the lobby along with a few other early arrivals. I reviewed the Signum line of pens, Penstop is the sole U.S. distributors for this line of exceptionally beautiful Italian pens in sterling, vermeil and celluloid at great prices. These were introduced at the show, and will soon be on sale at many U.S. dealers including Fountain Pen Hospital.

Jim Marshall

Guido Staltari and Peter Ford arrived from Australia, again holding the world distance record for attending a pen show. Joel and Sheryll Tyre arrived, David Nishimura, Jim Marshall from UK.
Dick Egolf, President of Sailor and Rob Cole, VP Marketing arrived, very happy with great expectations for the show as they are the show sponsor as well as Don Yendle, President of Conway Stewart who brought some outstanding pens for the show display.
First amazing story :
Rob Cole showed me a stunning ballpoint pen with a great story. About 30 years ago or so Conway Stewart placed an order for ballpoint pens from Japan using a brilliant material called silk celluloid. This material is produced in a brilliant blue, bronze and purple with a dazzling shimmer and reflection. This ballpoint is a small pocket pen, about 4 ” long with silver chrome trim and has a smooth twist action. A few years ago one of these vintage ballpoints sold at a Bonham’s auction for $200. and the old fountain pen in the same silk celluloid material sold for over $1,200. The 30 year old order for about 2,000 ballpoints was long forgotten in the warehouse when suddenly they were found, and will be finally shipped to Sailor in the U.S. very soon.

Thursday morning will be a milling of the crowd in the lobby until the two Hospitality Suites open about noon for early traders on 12th floor overlooking O'Hare airport landing approach. Then a rush to claim 1/2 tables, everyone spreads their pens and goodies and we're off to the sport of pens. This will be non-stop until about midnite, with a short break around 7 for a Chicago pizza feast, (wash those hands before touching any pens !! ) There will be about 20 dealer/trader tables but it will be elbow to elbow with everyone jostling for first pickin's.

THURSDAY
"It was a dark and stormy night"...with the terrific thunder and lightening storm from Wed which finally blew over, but the 'lectricity in the early trader's Hospitality Suite was really sparking.
Here's how an early pen show breakfast happens. Early am breakfast with everyone "people watching" to see who's coming and going and what's that I see...under their arms those nice black leather zip cases hugged close to the chest. Tables of two and four become groups of 4-6-8 and over the din of tinkling china I can hear "zip zip zippy zip" It has begun. Some are passed from one table to another, and you can tell by the leaning profiles exactly what they are looking at, and it's not the Eggs Benedict.

Paul Erano

After breakfast it's milling in the lobby, gathering in groups around small tables and huddling over open pen cases. Here is where deals are made, extremely rare pens are brought for specific buyers and sometimes never seen again...until maybe an estate auction 10 or 20 years from now.
Waiting for the word...around noon the Hospitality Suites will open and everyone trying to look casual while making a beeline to the elevators to punch floor 12 and grab some table top real estate. It's not the java jolt making the heart go thump, we're off to the races!!

David Isaacson

About 20 tables set up in one room, filled right away with floor to ceiling windows giving great pen show "buying light", as opposed to poorly lit rooms we call "selling light".
Collectors from France, Spain, Germany, UK, Australia, NZ, Buenos Aires and Long Grove, IL jockeyed around the tables for first dibs with short frenzies when Dick Johnson brought in a load of Conklin ephemera...I couldn't even get near, oh well, next time. My treasure for the day, or even the show, given me by Miroslav was a great 1930's Pelikan ink blotter.

Lunch? What's lunch? Hardly anyone leaves, it's more like send someone down for a sandwich, no one is crazy to give up a good table spot, so it's non-stop...Chicago style.
Dick Egolf and Rob Cole of Sailor strolled the room and I could see Dick's inside jacket pocket literally sagging with a load of some distinctive Sailor and Conway Stewart pens, Don Yendle from Conway Stewart UK was darting around the room also. Maryann Zucker had her new pen lines spread for dealers to view, this will be shown very soon on her new website, to be announced on Pentrace soon - look out for these stunning works of art with Grecian column clips.

Don Lavin

Don Lavin arrives and sets up the official table to distribute show badges and suddenly everyone has a name on a bright red tag. Thanks for the complimentary cold sodas, chilled water, cookies and cheese munchies !

I had to leave early to take care of day job biz, but the crowd was still buzzing and I'll be back early in am to start plastering the walls with show sponsors Sailor, Pentrace and Parker Spitfire posters.

FRIDAY Early trading day
Today we have one half the Main Ballroom and collectors are allowed to take one half tables.
The room fills very quickly with many people gathering in groups when large boxes or cases are opened with large quantities of pens or ephemera.

The Main Ballroom

The day passes quickly with constant movement of collectors and dealers searching for pens and bargains among the table top treasures. This is actually a pre-show trading and selling day with almost everyone being interested in vintage pens. New pen dealers do not open up until Saturday and Sunday.
Chicago is well known as a vintage pen show so Friday and Saturday is heavily attended.

Buddy Guy's Legends

Friday night was the unofficial Blues Night, but it was just a few of us, so we took the scenic route to Buddy Guy’s Legends downtown Chicago. Great Blues and southern Delta Mississippi food was a real treat. A quick downtown tour by cab and we were back in time for more late night trading before the trading room doors were locked.

SATURDAY When two or more gather…it’s an event
Dealer set up starts at 9 am and everyone rushes in to claim tables and spread the goods.
My routine, same as many others is to claim a table and then rush about for early pickings.
Geoffrey Parker arrived and we displayed the new 2003 model in the vintage Parker aircraft series. This year it is the 1941 RAF Presentation Spitfire named the GEO S PARKER, donated to the RAF by employees of Canada and Great Britain. This model is the result of many years of highly detailed research.

L-R Geoffrey Parker, Miro Tischler and Len Provisor

Geoffrey surprised us all with a laptop presentation of a family home movie showing the delivery of the first Parker corporate aircraft, the 1928 Fairchild FC2W2 “Duofold” to the Janesville Airport. Seen on this film for the first time shown to the public is a remarkable scene that shows the towering 6’ 2” George S. Parker with his wife Matilda and several friends enjoying rides on the new aircraft.
Soon Geoffrey was off into the midst of traders and collectors looking for his own special treasures.
The Pentrace story was also well presented with a laptop presentation on my table, and many people visited for Snailee badges and to say hello. Of course I also had plenty of free ink blotters to give everyone who visited.

Second amazing story :
A lady friend arrives who I had been speaking with since January. She is interested to sell her 20 year 300 pen collection of rare early Parker, Waterman, Onoto, A.A. Waterman and Mabie Todd eyedroppers, among others. Too late to commission to the auction, I arranged for them to be reviewed and fairly appraised prior to the show so she would know what to expect. Sterling over red hard rubber, Waterman high relief metal work, repousse, and other very attractive pens. A few feet into the room she was surrounded and the pens were sold so quickly that most people in the room did not even know she was there. The collection appeared to have an English focus with one early Waterman eyedropper having a nib marked England.
I heard that during the show a Parker Aztec and half Aztec appeared with a private collector but I did not have the opportunity to see this.

Dip Nib

The auction preview was set up for review from 10am to 3pm, and a silent auction was set up also in the same room from 11am to 2pm.
Popular seminars on pen repairs were conducted, John Mottishaw gave expert advice on nib repairs and Terry Clark, professional photographer gave a wonderful presentation on digital photography complete with slide presentations.
At 4pm the trading rooms closed down and the auction was held from 4 to 7 pm. After the auction a Cocktail Hour was hosted by Rob Rosenberg of Conklin Pen Company.
The trading rooms opened after 7pm and the fun of pens continued right up to midnight.
Richard Binder and his wife Barbara were a no-stop event this day, a man on a mission and telling me he has the greatest pleasure seeing the look on his customer’s face when he sees their response to his work.

SUNDAY The Main Event
Well, last year my friend Miroslav saw pictures of a huge flea market I attended with about 1,000 exhibitors. Nothing comes close to this in Zagreb, so it was high on his list for Sunday 6am. Not one to disappoint him, up at 5am and still bleary eyed from Saturday, we went over and ran around for a few hours. All I found was a nice large box with a variety of vintage Wahl leads, Miro found some other great American junk which will be treasures back home. I did not see one of my pen friends waving at me, however later back at the Show he showed me what he found. A very clean giant Waterman 58 in terrific condition, woodgrain barrel with a mismatched ripple cap. Result, he’ll find the matching parts at the show and have two stunning pens.
What luck, I’m happy for him as he is a good friend.
Back at the show the dealer set up was from 8 to 10 am, leaving plenty of time to roam the tables before opening the doors to the public.

The Sailor Table

Sailor and Conway Stewart were set up in front of the room and are immediately the most popular spot in town as they give away 500 bottles of ink from Conway Stewart and some great Maki-e graphic ink blotters provided by Pentrace and myself. Their exceptional Limited Edition pens were displayed. Guests also wrote letters to Sailor’s Master Nib Designer Mr. Nagahara on special stationery to extend greetings from Chicago. Mr. Nagahara was not able to attend and we hope to see him next year.

The British Consul General, Dick Egolf and Don Yendle on right.

Around 2 pm the Consul General from Great Britain arrived as a special guest to greet Mr. Don Yendle from Conway Stewart. Drawings were made for some special prize pens donated by Sailor and Conway Stewart, making two winning guests very happy.
My ticket was only two numbers away….dang!

Conklin Nozacs

Rob Rosenberg from Conklin introduced two new color in his Nozac series, one is a brilliant red and green patterned material called Rain Forest, the other is a beautiful golden called Sunburst. The new Glider ballpoints were also shown, the fountain pen in this series is one of their best selling models ever produced. A few other new products are planned to be introduced very soon, one of which is a new crescent filler with strong emphasis on a vintage design.

Fountain Pen Hospital, Ed Fingerman (center) and Terry Wiederlight (right)

Fountain Pen Hospital was a show case attraction with Terry Wiederlight and Ed Fingerman handing out the best new pen reference catalog in the business. Their display is chest high and loaded with the latest new pens that collectors were just waiting to see, and sales were brisk all day long. Next to FPH was Aurora with their table showcase. Delta also exhibited featuring most of their new pen brands.

Richard Binder

Richard Binder and his wife Barbara were busy creating those wonderful Italifine nibs, and he had a constant flow of customers in awe at his work. Richard created a great new brochure to demonstrate his specialty nibs. His opening sentence in reproduced Italifine script is ….”My great interest in life is the nurturing and care of my relationships with others…” by Katie Lynn Hill. How appropriate to remember our friend.

Penstop - L-R, Kim Sosin, Steve and Maryann Zucker

Steve and Maryann Zucker at PENSTOP had a great reception for their new Signum pens.
Richard Jarvis exhibited, this was his first Chicago show and he was very pleased.
Sam and Frank at Pendemonium were set up in the lobby hallway with their huge assortment of everything a pen person needs. Inks, papers, pens, books and stationery, this is a must stop tradition, especially to see her trademark ink stained towels. Sam hosted a special Sheaffer Tour and party at her store in Ft Madison just last weekend, and it was very well attended.
Gradually the crowd started thinning out in the afternoon and dealers started to depart for their return home trips. My wife and I stayed to the very end, as did Geoffrey Parker who was once again very gracious to attend the Show and greeted so many people. His next show attendance may be Washington, DC in August and I plan to attend as well.
Soon the room was filled with the sound of ripping carton tape and luggage carts squeaking down the halls. The constant din of chat slowly fades, good byes and hugs, loose pen literature strewn about tables and floor, hotel staff soon appear and the tables start to disappear…a whirlwind weekend starting on Wednesday is almost at a close.
Someone has to remind Bill Weakley and Susan Wirth the show is almost over, both remain until the very last warm body leaves the building. It’s their own tradition, you know.