A longish time ago, my Mom gave me a fountain pen that had been knocking around her family for years. It was a handsome deep salmon colour; I think I used it a couple of times, then set it aside. The next time it occurred to me to use it, nothing seemed to work and I heard a rattling sound inside the pen. So much for that plan! I kept the pen, though, for the sake of continuity with Mom, and one day in Durham I learned that there was a guy who repairs pens, who lived right in town with me (and in fact, who worked at Duke near me). I arranged to meet Ross and to hand over the pen to him for repair.
Ross explained this Esterbrook (identification was a no-brainer, since it says ‘Esterbrook’ on the clip and the barrel imprint) was a ‘third-tier’ pen, but that it stood out for having handsome plastics, a simple, easy to maintain lever-filling system, and excellent nibs. Indeed, Esterbrook nibs are readily interchangeable, and could be obtained in a variety of styles. Esties are hard-working, durable, good-looking, excellent writers, and are still relatively easy to track down in the USA (much less so in Britain; I haven’t seen any bargain Esterbrooks, and only even seen a few that passed through Peter Crook’s hands, via South Africa). These are perfect pens for beginners to collect and repair, and so I (as a beginner) did just that.
When I set up the camera to shoot my Esties yesterday, I realised again that the pens will look less attractive than they would after a thorough ultrasonic cleaning. If I were a dealer, I’d track down such a cleaner, but that would be a luxury item for me as a casual user; for the time being, I just polish and buff them by hand. A number of these pens (I noticed) still want repair, which I’ll look into sometime. Without a hair dryer to warm the section slightly, though, it can be hard to open the pen for servicing the sac and J-bar.
Anyway, here’s the family:
The standard-issue item in the Esterbrook family is the ‘J’ pen with jewel (not really jewel jewels, but any cap-like decoration) on both ends — hence a double-jewel Esterbrook J. Esties come in six basic colours — Dubonnet Red, Black, Cobalt Blue, Green, Copper, and Grey — with some variations on the specific chades of the colours, depending on the batch of plastic. (Here I’m relying on Richard Binder’s research on colour names.) Here are my double-jewel Esterbrook Js:
![Esterbrook J Dubonnet (A)](http://farm8.staticflickr.com/7110/7521096520_3fe322d899.jpg)
![Esterbrook J Dubonnet (B)](http://farm9.staticflickr.com/8018/7521098192_221f37bc30.jpg)
(the one from Mom)
![Esterbrook J Dubonnet (C)](http://farm9.staticflickr.com/8423/7521147866_1182142c07.jpg)
![Esterbrook J Black](http://farm8.staticflickr.com/7256/7521101976_dc14a28f4c.jpg)
![Esterbrook J Foliage Green](http://farm9.staticflickr.com/8005/7521102820_61296a771c.jpg)
![Esterbrook J Pearl Grey](http://farm8.staticflickr.com/7130/7521104602_bae0397d4e.jpg)
![Esterbrook J Cobalt Blue (A)](http://farm9.staticflickr.com/8149/7521106200_818808b3db.jpg)
![Esterbrook J Cobalt Blue (B)](http://farm9.staticflickr.com/8008/7521107930_c458f69b92.jpg)
![Esterbrook J Copper](http://farm9.staticflickr.com/8014/7521111000_bce8b13e98.jpg)
(See that this pen has been heated and stretched, presumably by someone trying to repair it clumsily. That’s why I’m not fixing any of the pens at hand without a good, gentle heater.)
![Esterbrook J Brown ("Root Beer")](http://farm9.staticflickr.com/8159/7521111976_e3495a1ab1.jpg)
You can see that although the basic design in the same for each, they vary in small particulars. The fill lever sometimes has a rounded end, sometimes a spade-shaped end. Sometime the clip has ‘Esterbrook’ imprinted on it, sometimes not. The barrel imprint may vary. The coloration of the plastics vary. If I were a serious Esterbrook collector, I’d try to track down as many of these variations as I could, but I’m not that hard-core.
Before the J, Esterbrook made the Dollar Pen — same colours, but with a different clip design and the jewel on the cap is continuous with the clip, and engraved with ‘Esterbrook’:
Between the Dollar Pen and the double-jeweled J, Esterbrook tried out several designs; this is a single-jeweled Transitional J, with the distinctive three-fin jewel on top (no jewel at the bottom):
After the J, Esterbrook introduced two variations on the theme: the LJ, which was about as long as the J but more slender, and the SJ, which was both more slender and shorter (nothing to do with the Jesuits). I have a couple of LJs and several SJs:
![Esterbrook LJ Black](http://farm8.staticflickr.com/7128/7521126966_8d9f77ae0f.jpg)
(LJ)
![Esterbrook LJ Copper](http://farm9.staticflickr.com/8026/7521127516_7fec2abaee.jpg)
(LJ)
![Esterbrook SJ Foliage Green](http://farm8.staticflickr.com/7257/7521129286_3b6c9521c1.jpg)
(SJ)
![Esterbrook SJ Fern Green](http://farm9.staticflickr.com/8163/7521129968_5788e73f1c.jpg)
(SJ — and it looks as though sometime someone swapped the cap from a darker pen onto this)
![Esterbrook SJ Cobalt Blue](http://farm9.staticflickr.com/8155/7521131514_51ca57dd4d.jpg)
(SJ)
![Esterbrook SJ Dubonnet](http://farm9.staticflickr.com/8027/7521133080_33d7473575.jpg)
(SJ)
![Esterbrook SJ Dubonnet (B)](http://farm9.staticflickr.com/8163/7521134788_ede2d808a9.jpg)
(SJ)
![Esterbrook SJ Black (Ft Wayne)](http://farm9.staticflickr.com/8424/7521136660_ec1056de0a.jpg)
(There are a lot of black SJs out there with custom imprints — many Bell telephone Esties, and this one’s from the Fort Wayne School System)
![Esterbrook SJ Black](http://farm8.staticflickr.com/7116/7521138948_575ca20a7d.jpg)
And there was a vogue for making special pens for women — this was the Esterbrook contribution to that species, the CH ‘Purse Pen’ in pastel colours, even shorter than the SJ:
![Esterbrook CH Purse Pen Peach](http://farm9.staticflickr.com/8433/7521139788_76305b3c35.jpg)
![Esterbrook Purse Pen](http://farm4.staticflickr.com/3440/3400471156_c6de694f80.jpg)
(This pink Purse Pen was horribly abused by a previous owner; I’ve cleaned it up considerably, but not completely, alas, since I took this photo a few years ago)
And finally, the royalty of my Esterbrook assembly, the LJ ‘icicle’ pens, so called for their characteristic vertical stripes:
So that’s the Esterbrook wing of my pen museum, the oldest specific collection among my pens (I’ve had other fountain pen types from longer ago, but this is the oldest set I deliberately gathered).
Gorgeous photos and terrific post!
I still have two of my Pens from Grammar school. I attended a new school in Azusa, CA in about 1952 (St. Frances Of Rome) and the nuns only allowed us to use Esterbrook pens.
I filled one of them last week and it still writes as well as it did when I got it. My favorite one (a black 2 jewel) must need a new sac as it no longer works. The other is a white purse pen. Both are stamped Esterbrook and are made in the USA.
Keep an eye on that purse pen, Michael; they’re less common and more prized. They (especially the white ones) sometimes sold in pairs with a similar pen body that served as a thermometer caddy. The black J should be easy to get repaired (even I can refit Esties).
The one I covet is the fountain pen model whose cap unscrews to reveal that it’s an aspergillum. I know Parker made one, and I’ve heard that Waterman did; I don’t know about Esterbrook, but that would be a great catch.