THE “MAJESTIC” HAUL OF VINTAGE INDIAN & FOREIGN FOUNTAIN PENS

The Majestic area in Bangalore is one of the busiest areas in the city.  It is a warren of lanes and by-lanes with a number of old and new shops from where one can buy almost everything from pins and needles to clothes and shoes; and added to the bustle in and around these shops are the crowds in front of numerous eateries and cinema theatres.  Someone unfamiliar with the area could easily get lost here and end up in a different area altogether. Whenever I am in Bangalore, I pass through this area through one of its main roads and go quickly to Gandhinagar to browse in the bookshops there.  A couple of years ago, I made brave to enter this bustling network of lanes to see if I could find some old stationery shops and also see if I could find some old pens.  I went in and out of a number of small shops and was able to put together a small haul of three Indian pens and four foreign pens.  I found the Indian pens in one shop and the foreign pens in another.  The ones I picked were the good ones among the pens in old boxes.

I found a Clipper and two Plato FPs and very surprisingly found a Cross, a Pilot, a Parker, and a Sheaffer…

Here are the photos of the pens…

All three Indian FPs…the two blue ones are Platos and the black with metal cap is the Clipper…

This pen is called CLIPPER AIR FLOW and along with ‘MADE IN INDIA,’ these letterings can be seen on the barrel…very faint… initially, I wondered what AIR FLOW meant and then out of curiosity, I opened the barrel and discovered that this pen has an aerometric filling system… the clip too is interesting…it kind of rolls into a very small cylinder towards the end…a ‘roll clip?’

The nib on the Clipper is interesting…a kind of eagle is engraved on it, apart from the brand name and IRIDIUM…the surface of the nib is not smooth and it is kind of rough…I tried to remove the roughness, but it remained and I felt the roughness is the natural texture of the nib and left it at that…

The writing on the barrel says…PLATO 66; REGD.; MADE IN INDIA; 1974 … the paint on the lettering has faded away and one can make these markings out if only one looked very carefully…this pen is almost 40 years old…!!!

The Plato No. 111…REGD.; MADE IN INDIA … again these letterings are very faint … and in this pen, there is no year of manufacture … 

The ends of the Clipper and Plato No. 111…

The tops of the Clipper and Plato No. 111…

Aaah…the foreign pens…CROSS, PILOT (B nib), SHEAFFER and PARKER… all these pens are in various states of repair, but I didn’t have the heart to leave them back and bought them anyway…and I didn’t have a Cross FP…

The nibs of these foreign pens…

Here endeth the account of the ‘Majestic’ haul…

POSTSCRIPT: My friend Hari had written a post on The Fountain Pen Network on his haul of vintage Indian celluloid FPs that he found in a shop in Kalasipalya in Bangalore (http://www.fountainpennetwork.com/forum/index.php/topic/269605-the-kalasipalaya-haul-of-vintage-indian-celluloids/) and that post reminded me of the pens I found in ‘Majestic’ area in Bangalore and inspired me to put up this post…thanks Hari…!!