Early Two-Color Pens

By Giovanni Abrate

October 2014

 

Early two-color ballpoint pens In this article we will look at the development of so-called "marking pens" in the late 1940s and early 1950s. Marking pencils were widely used by teachers to highlight errors in essays and test papers and by accountants and shopkeepers. These pencils are still made today! This is an example of a marking pencil made by Hardmuth in the Czech Republic:   We will not cover in this brief review those complex marvels of fountain pen design that were the Colorado by Quadretti and OMAS, or the incredible Zerollo, vintage pens that represent the pinnacle of fountain pen design and that were produced under license in France, Great Britain and other Countries. These pens deserve their own articles! More information about these and similar pens can be found in the archives of Pentrace and in the Forum at Pennamania.it, where you will also find a comprehensive coverage of these extraordinary pens.     The Zerollo: a marvel of engineering! (photo courtesy of Pennamania.it)     This is a British pens with Italian roots (Zerollo), the Twopen by Dunhill:   This is the famous Colorado by Quadretti, sold through OMAS:     Almost from the very start ballpoint pens were available with a number of differently colored inks. Purple, green, black, blue and green were available almost from the very beginning. In the case of the Eversharp Inca Pen, the colors were described as Fire Red, Leaf Green, Temple Blue and Jungle Black!     Soon, special two color pens (red and blue, usually) were produced, to replace the popular red/blue pencils used mostly by schoolteachers and accountants.   These mechanical pencils were very popular and were made by many pen companies, often clad in gold or other precious metals.   Mechanical two color marking pencils are still manufactured today:   This is an Autopoint pencil, made in the USA   A vintage two-color pencil by Scripto (USA) Many companies developed two-color ballpoint pens at the beginning of the 1950s. There were several approaches used to provide a twin ballpoint pen that would be easy to use in either color:   1.      The very early pens almost always had the writing points at the two extremities of the barrel.  The picture shows an American "Romur"  pen, from the late 1940s and the original writing points. The picture shows a very early Romur pen. The sales leaflet shows the Romur pen, which at the time was priced at 640 Liras in Italy (approximately 1.05 USD). The leaflet also shows a tube of ballpoint ink, used to refill spent pens and even mentions replacement spheres!     2.       A similar pen from the early 1950s, probably Italian:   Early Italian Marking pen 3.       Another slim two color pen, from Italy:      Italian marking pen from the 1950s 4.       A different approach was used by this company: the points were stacked one above the other. This was best suited to accountant work, as it was quicker and easier when writing small characters or numbers to just twist the pen in one’s fingers in order to write with a different point.    Side-by-side writing points Another similar pen, by a different manufacturer:   Side-by-side writing points 5.       This pen is unique in that the barrel is not round, but oval. It offers a very comfortable grip for the writer: Oval section pen: tall and narrow 6.       LUS introduced retractable two color pens in the 1960s: this design was later copied by many other penmakers and BIC is still using it! LUS was also the first company to produce four and six-color pens!     Three early multi-color pens by LUS of Italy 7.       Multi-color retractable pens, also introduced by LUS, became popular in the late 1960s. Again, BIC copied the LUS design and still makes a very similar pen. Classic BIC two-color pen - current production   8.       These jumbo multicolor pens first appeared in Italy in the early 1970s: they are now made in China and are even available with perfumed inks! Chinese multi-colored pen. aimed at the children market 9.  This interesting pen, the Coleto by Pilot of Japan, represents the state of the art in multi color pens and will take ballpoint refills, mechanical pencil leads and a stylus! The high-Tec Coleto pen from Japan This short review is far from complete, but it gives an idea of the beginning of the two-color ballpoint pens and its evolution.     Giovanni Abrate

 

 

 

 

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