Today — again, on a weekend — I’ve been working on an uncommon specimen. Two of them, actually, considering that it was a pen/pencil set. So what’s this about the Cold War?
Well, we all know that innumerable companies, worldwide, copied the Parker “51”. It’s a great pen, it was immensely popular, and those two facts add up to the potential for profit, whether deserved or not. Parker profited mightily from the “51”, selling tens of millions of them and also leveraging the technology into virtually every pen the company’s produced since. Other companies, too, profited. In Italy, a whole community of “51” counterfeiters sprang up in Settimo Torinese and flourished until the authorities finally shut them down. The Shanghai Hero Pen Company of China, which arose from the ashes of Parker’s Chinese operation after Mao’s goons took over all foreign holdings, is still making pens like the 616, a “51” copy, and the 100, 329, 330, etc., which blend “51” and 61 technology and designs.
One of the less commonly seen “51” copies had its birth in the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. Under the Soyuz (“Union”) logo seen above, the Soviet Union produced this pen (and a matching pencil):
As you’d expect if you’ve ever made a close-up comparison of any other Soviet merchandise with its Western equivalents, this pen is relatively crude. The cap finish is substandard, and the parts don’t align as well as they should But there’s a real collector inside that cradles a nib and feed that are functionally identical to those in a “51”, even to the breather tube. No, the pen doesn’t have a Vacumatic filler; it’s an accordion-filling model. And it writes surprisingly nicely. The nib’s tines are a little softer than those on a “51” nib (cheaper gold alloy, dontcha know), so there’s a pleasant springy road feel.
My guess is that these high-end Soviet writing instruments were made for important Party officers or members of the Politburo; the thought that the average Muscovite could have afforded to trot into GUM and walk out with one is laughable.
The Soyuz factory in Leningrad (now St. Petersburg) produced a variety of pens, from the 1950s model shown here to a less costly version with a cap that”s plastic like the barrel. Later, there were cartridge/converter pens in a style similar to that of the Montblanc Generations, even to the prismatic transparent yellow barrel band that allows the user to check the ink supply.
The pen shown here and its matching pencil belong to a European client of mine. The ironic contrast between these pieces and the other two pens he sent gave me a good chuckle. A GF-capped Parker 61 is just the perfect pen to illustrate the discrepancy in finish quality. And his Sheaffer Snorkel demonstrator shows how much better the internals of Western products can look. But don’t get me wrong: looks aren’t everything, and you can cut down a tree with an axe if you don’t have a chainsaw. Soviet-made pens may not have the glossy finish and superb engraving quality of the Parker or the high-tech mechanism of the Snorkel, but they write. They actually write well and reliably. And, after all, what’s a pen for, if it’s not to write?
