Beyond the glass mountain
about the glass nibs
Old glass-tipped pens are a real rarity these days. Drop or tap the end of a nib once and the irreparable breakage only adds to the value of the remaining intact nibs. However, you can also buy new glass pens to enhance your handwriting experience, especially if you use them on a sunny day.
On a small island north of Venice, the glassblowers of Murano started writing with ballpoint pens around the 1700s and then began producing glass pens. Passing on the secret of glassblowing to foreigners was punishable by death, so for a long time the Murano glassware monopolized the market for a long time. These glass-tipped pens before the 1920s, before the advent of fountain pens, were a popular worldwide. The tiny grooves in the tip of the nib acted as capillaries and formed an ink reservoir.
A one ink stroke, you could write for about a sentence. From steel nibs, which were already common in the 19th century, the glass-tipped pens had unique properties, which the use of indigo paper made indispensable.
With the introduction of indigo paper (a paper made from the extract of indigo shrubs, suitable for copying), the need to be able to write on copy paper with ordinary fountain pens has increased.
It was during this period that glass-tipped fountain pens appeared on the market. This was the period when fountain pens were invented.
To make an indigo copy, the writing instrument had to be pressed firmly against the paper. We had to wait until József László Bíró invented the ballpoint pen, which solved this problem. The nib used to make copies had to be very hard in order to get the necessary pressure on the paper, as conventional pen nibs would split under the pressure required and the ink flow would be interrupted.
About In 1912, the Kaweco company changed from glass to agate, using a twist-end pen nibs. The agate tips allowed the desired pressure to be achieved to apply the desired pressure to the paper while writing, but their production more expensive than glass nibs.
Below is a Kaweco Sport fountain pen with a glass nib.
The Montblanc market range also included glass-tipped fountain pens (safety fountain pen "M.G. 400" and push-button fountain pen "M.G. 420"). The modified logo was "Montblanc Glass Fountain Pen". The glass nib series was a simpler type. This pen had a cap about 12 cm long. In a 1930s catalogue it was described as "a cheap pen for indigo paper". In another catalogue it was priced at only 3 RM (Reichsmark).By comparison, it was the cheapest fountain pen, while the next cheapest was a Reflex slide pen, which could be bought for RM 4. By comparison, this was the cheapest fountain pen, while the next cheapest was a Reflex (a pen for students) which could be bought for RM 4. This is very different from the RM 50 for which the pen 129 was available in the same catalogue!
Later, carbonless nibs in the traditional nib shape were also produced. They could be manufactured in different ways to prevent the nibs from unravelling. Pelikan, for example, undertook to produce nibs for the 100N models with a much stronger (stiffer) material than the standard nibs. These nibs were visually indistinguishable from normal nibs, but were significantly heavier. However, the increased weight came at a higher material cost, so a cheaper method was developed to achieve similar writing characteristics. To do this, the opening of the nib was shortened considerably, thus reducing the effective length of the nib. The shortened length caused the nib to spread out considerably less and was therefore much harder than normal nibs. Since the breathing hole of Pelikan fountain pens remained in the same place, a second hole had to be made closer to the end of the nib. However, there are nibs with a shortened nib tip opening and only one breathing hole, which are placed conspicuously far forward.
Visconti started producing celluloid pens in the late 1980s and early 1990s. Some early series were made of celluloid and were also available with gold-plated nibs.In the early 1990s, Visconti launched the Ragtime series, with a design reminiscent of the style of the first decade of the 1900s.The same concept was used for the Classic series, which is reminiscent of the flat-top models of the early 1920s.Both pens of the Classic series are gilded and have glass nibs.
Some Japanese glass nib pens currently in production:
Hanabi glass pen
Shizuku glass pen
Tamas Szucs / 2024.03.
