Fountain pens - anyone write?

I remember needing a fountain pen in 7th grade. Schools used to teach penmanship along with many other skills they no longer include in the curriculum.
 
Capt. E said:
I remember needing a fountain pen in 7th grade. Schools used to teach penmanship along with many other skills they no longer include in the curriculum.
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I remember those days, but I think we learned in the third grade. The ink bottles had a pocket, for lack of remembering the correct term. I do remember using some cheap fountain pen during those days. We had desks with a hole in the upper right side, that stored our bottle of ink. You filled it by turning the bottle upside down (make sure the top is on tight.). There was less chance of spilling if one used that.

If someone has mentioned that already I apologize. I remember this thread when it started, but haven't looked at it in a very long time, and did not try to read the whole thing again. We didn't really use a fountain pen that much, but rather pencils. Pencils were cheaper and easier to correct mistakes. Did I mention we had erasers on our pencils. By the time I found any advantage to using ink again, ball point pens were all the rage. Still are I guess, at least the most used.
 
Just happened on this thread. I learned to write in grammar school with a fountain pen and used one regularly until my college days ... when I switched to most using a mechanical pencil since I was doing Mathematics and the ability to erase my proof attempts was critical.

I rarely write anything of any length with any kind of pen anymore, given that I type most everything of importance, jot quick notes with pencil or roller ball pen if I am not using a device. But I still have a Namiki Vanishing Point fountain pen for when I'm moved to write something longhand that's more than a jotted note. And I still have a lovely old Parker, part of a complete set of fountain/ballpoint/pencil set, somewhere in my mess as well.

Hmm, I need some ink to fill the Namiki... :)

G
 
The other skill you needed in our school days was sharpening a pencil with a knife. I used to scrounge old used razor blades from my father and fit them in a holder and use it to sharpen pencils. What health and safety would make of it I do not know...

Nowadays the wood they use is rubbish; even a scalpel gets blunted quickly.

Regards, David
 
David Hughes said:
The other skill you needed in our school days was sharpening a pencil with a knife. I used to scrounge old used razor blades from my father and fit them in a holder and use it to sharpen pencils. What health and safety would make of it I do not know...
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I guess our school was upscale. We had a pencil sharpener.
 
I am almost 50 and have been using extensively fountain pens. Daily writers are currently Parker Duofold Centennial and Sailor 1911. Always with converter. Almost always used Parker Quink. Loved that smell. When they changed formula and royal blue became teal after 15 days switched to Lamy ink.Have found and bought Camlin ink from India which is next in the line (not yet) which still has that wonderfull old solv-x smell.
Best regards
 
I use fountain pens to write first drafts of any document that will be long and complex. Then I word process the drafts and all editing is done on the computer. I have tried to compose only on the computer and it's fine for e-mail messages, forum postings, and the like, but not for important documents in which the wording and arguments are of critical importance. I wish I could move past the analogue stage in writing - it would be more efficient if I did (but keep the analogue stage in photography!). I started printing rather than writing in cursive when I was in university and studied Russian language for two years. Learning the language required writing in cursive Cyrillic, which involves multiple letters that look the same as cursive letters in English, but with completely different phonetic values. It was totally confusing, so I stopped writing in English in cursive, which was no great loss as my script was quite ugly and unreadable anyway.
 
pvdhaar said:
Indeed, you never get those squiggly red lines under your words when you're writing...
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And, with a pen and paper you can write in black or blue/black and underline in red if you have two pens and two bottles of ink. Try doing that with a WP; yet typewriters had no problems doing it...

Regards, David

PS Seriously, I think the point about pens - like film cameras - is that you had to think first before committing yourself. With digit you can never quite make your mind up as it is so easy to adopt the scattergun approach. BTW, I wonder how long it will be before they talk about analogue pens and analogue cars as they seem to think analogue means old fashioned...
 
David Hughes said:
Seriously, I think the point about pens - like film cameras - is that you had to think first before committing yourself. With digit you can never quite make your mind up as it is so easy to adopt the scattergun approach.
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If you suffer from that problem, by all means use a fountain pen and a film camera.
 
If a student makes notes with a pen or pencil on paper in a lecture she will remember more that afternoon than if she had made similar notes typed into a laptop computer.

A man doodling with a pen on paper during a meeting is more likely to be able to provide the answer to a question about the guest speaker’s analysis delivered 30 mins earlier than his colleague could, after staring out the wondow during that same lecture.

At least one of these is from past Proc Roy Soc B.

A pen on paper puts one in the room, at that place and at that time.

Medical consultations accompanied by handwritten notes in ink serve the writer and the patient in different ways. The former has the same benefit as the student above, plus the reflected benefit the patient enjoys, he being satisfied by this documentary attention so carefully and wonderfully recorded in ink with such devotion by the very attentive doctor.
 
David Hughes said:
Thinking about what I am going to write or photograph beforehand has never been a problem but thank you for your concern...
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It hasn't been a problem for me either, which is why I don't have a problem using a computer to write or a digital camera to make images. I do use a film camera sometimes, but for different reasons.
 
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