Pen Show Review: Columbus, Ohio 2012Posted on: Saturday, November 17, 2012

The Columbus Ohio Pen Show is one of my favorites.  I know what some of you are thining, No, really??  Well, if I have to keep convincing some of you to make it to a pen show, this is going to be a good example why.  Columbus, Ohio is the last show on the US pen show schedule for the year, and it’s a big one, jam packed with activities, great pens, good friends and more.  It’ll keep you going until the next show comes along in two months.
We begin preparation for the show like we always do, about a week before.  With the new Pen Room in place, this makes it a bit easier as most of our pens and ink are all in the same place.  Lisa is the master craftsman when it comes to packing and she does a phenomenal job of making sure there is no wasted space in every box and when packing the car.  For the last time this year, I had to precede the departure by putting in extended hours at work to make up for the lost time on Thursday and Friday. This meant getting up at 5:00 am on Wednesday, having Lisa drop me off at work, working a solid ten hours, then getting picked up at the end of the day.  There’s not a better sight in the world then being greeted by your wife with a whole car load full of pens and then heading off to a pen show!

Since we both have a bit of energy, and aren’t really hungry, we head out on the road for a while before stopping to get something to eat.  We like to achieve some progress before we stop again.  Columbus is about a 9.5-10 hour drive for us so that’s reasonably short.  After an hour or so, and after discussing how we both weren’t hungry, we decided we were hungry.  Wendy’s it was, sort of a new tradition for us, and out of the car for one of their spicy chicken sandwiches.  I’m normally pretty easy going when it comes to restaurants, but for some reason I decided to be a little more picky.  All I wanted was the Spicy chicken sandwich, cheese and bacon.  No tomato, no lettuce, no mayo.  You would have thought I asked for it to be cooked at 84.3 degrees, crispy not floppy bacon, and a piece of jalapeno jack on top.  I caused a stir of chaos at the register, the new trainee becoming thoroughly confused, the trainer fumbling her way through the register controls, and a manager having to come over to void the whole thing and start over.  Oh, and I want a chocolate frosty instead of a drink.  All went well and we were soon back on the road.  I’m sure I was the topic of conversation later that evening for someone, “We had this real pain in the butt customer who…”

Travel was pretty smooth, no inclement weather, no real problems until around 1:00 am when our new GPS decided to tell me to take an alternative route due to traffic congestion. Congestion at 1:00 am?  Surely that couldn’t be correct, but almost immediately after the exit it wanted me to take, there was traffic backed up for about half a mile.  A car had apparently rolled and started on fire.  Several fire trucks, an ambulance, some police cars and about twenty minutes later we were back at full speed.  Live and learn I guess.

We pulled in to Dublin, Ohio around 3:30-4:00 in the morning local time, and hoping we may be able to get in our room early were somewhat surprised to hear the entire hotel had been sold out the evening before, but we were welcome to sleep in our car in the parking lot.  Well, not exactly the best of circumstances, but what can you do?  We ended up having to turn on the car about every 30-45 minutes just to get some heat (it was cold!), so sleep is really a relative word.

Around 7:00 we decided this was all quite silly, and we headed over to the Crown Plaza just down the street to check in and get ready.  Running on adrenaline at this point, we were able to get in and start unloading our car.  Since this was a pre-public day all dealers were allotted one half of the table space they had purchased for the public days.  Space is at a premium as it is in the small or “satellite” room, so our four tables was distilled down to two.  How do you put all that stuff on to two tables?  Well, the simple answer is you don’t.

Since we knew this was the room we were going to be in for the rest of the show, we were fortunate in getting to set up in the same space we would be on Friday.  Ink goes up first then, as it is heavy and hard to move once put up.  We skip most of the modern pens and put the vintage pens out.  This is primarily a vintage pen show after all.

Thursday went well, we had some moderate traffic between vendors, and directly across from us was long time collector Dick Johnson.  The moment he began unpacking a whole swarm of people flocked to his table to see what he had.  I wanted to go, but there were so many people there was no way to even get a look so I stayed back.  Actually, as every new vendor came, the same swarm effect happened at every table.  These were some hard core collectors!

Our good friend Presnal Wood set up close to us, so I had to go and thank him for selling Lisa the MHR Wirt eyedropper she gave me for our recent anniversary.  Of course, he had a bunch of newly discovered pens on his table to tempt me.  I tried to resist best I could and was able to hold out.  One cannot spend all their money on the first pre-public day!

Stuart Hawkinson, tool maker extraordinaire set up next to us.  I had contacted Stuart before the show and asked him to set aside some tools for me.  If you work on Parker 51’s, and have caps that are dinged up, Stuart has one of the best tools for helping remove those dings.  I picked up a couple more mandrels for 51 demi and 61 caps, then proceeded to continue to throw money at him every time he pulled out a new tool.  I grabbed some brushes, and a snorkel tube pliers as well.  Repair tools are always a good investment and they will pay for themselves sometimes after even one or two repairs.

The show seemed to end as quickly as it began Thursday, so we hurried over to the hotel to check in and unpack.  Since we brought our own dinner, we popped it in the microwave, grabbed a quick shower and then headed back over for the evening festivities, the wine and cheese party (and chocolate!), then the Discovery Auction.

I make no bones about pen show auctions being the best thing since sliced bread.  They’re fun, there is a limited amount of competition for certain items, and as such you can get good prices sometimes.  Also, you will find pens you won’t find elsewhere on the show floor, so if you want them, the auction is the place.  The Discovery Auction is a compilation of parts pens, lots of pens, and better pens with some issues (no nib, no cap, crack, etc.).  They don’t have the spit and polish of the higher ticket items in the Saturday auction.  I had attended the preview and while I didn’t see anything in particular I had to have, you never know when something will come up and people are sleeping.  Well, no such luck, I elected to save my money and wait instead of buying pens with issues.  This proved to be a strategic and successful move.  We were exhausted by this point anyway and about the only thing keeping us awake was the constant chuckling back and forth with Mike and Tim Byler who were sitting several chairs away.  I had no idea what they were saying most of the time, but it was all good.  Bidding was less spirited than we have seen in the past and some pieces went for pretty decent prices.

Friday morning was a whole new day.  A decent nights rest, breakfast, and we’re back at it unpacking our modern pens and setting everything up.  Public starts at 1:00 pm, but there was plenty of traffic before then.  It took a couple of hours to straighten everything out, but we took our time which was nice.  Bring on the people!

We started buying pens almost right away when a lot of about 20 pens came to the table.  We jumped at the chance to get some nice esterbrook and then about an hour later another bunch of pens showed up.  This time it was Sheaffer balance and Parker striped duofolds.  It was becoming a good day!  Since we didn’t have time at this point to organize the new acquisitions, they ended up in a big pile at the back of the table.

FPGeek Daniel Smith and his wife Kisha arrived in the morning and promptly won a door prize.  Unfortunately, it was not some expensive fountain pen, but a pink breast cancer ballpoint.  We promised pens when we sponsored him to come, but we never said what kind of pens!

As the day ended we covered our table and then headed down for the famous pizza party put on by Sam and Frank from Pendemonium.  40 pizzas seemed to be the right amount and every last piece was consumed.  It helped getting there a touch after it opened as this meant we had seats right next to the pizza!  For those that waited too long, well, better luck next year.  There was none left.

The annual PCA meeting followed, but we had enough time to grab a drink beforehand in the bar.  After the state of the union was given and a successful meeting directed by president Lisa, we headed back to the bar to have a couple drinks with Dan Smith and Mario Campa from Toys in the Attic.  After saying “only one more” about four times, and having some great conversation and playing with some great pens, we went back to the hotel to get some much needed rest.

Saturday is the big day at any show and we were prepared.  We make sandwiches in advance and pack soda and chips for lunch.  Whether or not we get to eat them is another story altogether!  Traffic was busy all day, so much so that I never actually made it out of the room to see any of the other vendors.  I made a strategic strike and walked across the aisle and bought a nice Swan Safety with beautiful metal cap.  While not really in my collecting focus, I was intrigued by this pen, as it is an eyedropper filled plastic pen with a stunning metal cap.  That fact the price was right certainly helped.

Our luck at purchasing pens continued, as we had someone come to the table with an orange Sheaffer 3-25 flat top pen.  While it was a beautiful clean pen, it had a slight chip out of the cap lip.  Since I couldn’t really get much from a damaged pen, I made an offer and was slightly surprised when they accepted.  At the price I paid, it goes in the collection.  We also managed to buy some more nice esterbrook (we can always use these!) and some much needed 9xxx series nibs.  Our pile of pens was now getting bigger!

Immediately after the show and to celebrate a successful day, we went to the bar for a drink, then headed over to the hotel restaurant for a wonderful meal with Dan and Kisha smith.  We had to poke a little fun at Dan because he happened to have his name pulled for the grand door prize on Saturday as well, a nice Bexley pen.  You had to be present to win, and he was out at a local pen store at the time, so another name was drawn.  The food was excellent and the rolls they brought out were simply amazing.  At the end there was no evidence any were on the table.

After dinner we headed over to the dessert party for what was an amazing array of chocolate, cream puffs, cookies, cakes, and all sorts of other goodies.  We grabbed a plate full and went across the hall to get a good seat for the auction.  Dan sat between Lisa and I and this proved to be a most interesting and entertaining situation.  Since we had the same auction number as the Thursday auction, we each had a bidder card and found ourselves on more than one occasion raising our cards for the same item.  This quickly became bidder 1a and 1b and on one occasion actually won a pen we didn’t actually win because of the confusion.  I did manage to accidentally win a 1937 Parker Vacumatic with reticulated barrel.  The price was so low I just had to throw in a bid, and much to my surprise, nobody bid any higher.  In fact my surprise was known to Terry Mawhorter as he offered to make the next bid increment only five dollars instead of ten to try and get me out of the obligation.  No worries, the pen was pretty nice and should clean up well.

The star of the auction for me was a very early dip pen with cap in mottled hard rubber.  The cap sports the Goodyear’s Patent of 1851 and the nib was a Joseph Monaghan New York #5.  Spirited biding ensued and when I had reached my limit, so had my competitors and the pen was mine.  A really fine example.

Just moments later it was as if everyone was asleep and I pulled down my final win of the night, a smaller screw cap eyedropper, unmarked, but in a lovely dark mottled hard rubber.  The barrel and threads on this one interested me a great deal, and it was a very clean pen.  I was happy it cost about the same price as a good meal.  Other pens sold for below market value, but one cannot purchase everything they see at the auction, there are simply too many pens.

Sunday morning came early again, this time, Lisa leaving me for a PCA meeting over the breakfast buffet at the hotel restaurant and leaving me to crappy coffee and a cold muffin in the hotel room.  No worries, I got the room pretty much packed up and when she returned we headed over for another good day at the show.

My first acquisition of the day I had seen just before we left Saturday night.  Hidden amongst all the parts on Richard Lotts table was a complete, near mint Wirt screw cap eyedropper with two gold filled barrel bands.  Chasing was crisp and despite being a smaller pen (about Waterman 12-1/2 size) was really pretty.  I grabbed it and didn’t look back.  Another Wish List item secured.

Sunday’s are usually slow days and you get a chance to talk with the other dealers and look over their pens.  Well this was not the case for us and we were quite busy most of the day.  I did get a chance to talk with Bruce Mindrup and watch his pen part plating demonstration.  It was really a fascinating demo, and after reading his article in the Pennant, and wanting to do this type of restoration was glad I could watch.  We plated one of the Parker striped Duofolds I had purchased two days before and it came out really nice.

About a half hour before the show ended a tall man came up to our table.  He was huffing and puffing and obviously had rushed to get to the show.  He indicated he had seen the ad in the paper not a half hour before and was glad to make it.  He carried with him a large cigar box.  Yes, a CIGAR BOX FULL OF PENS.  You know, what you dream about.  He sat at the table for what seemed like an eternity, telling me what was in it “Conklin, Sheaffer…”  Finally he opened the box and I saw a smaller orange Endura, a couple of Waterman pens, several hard rubber pens and pencils, some esterbrook and a lovely John Holland #8 dip pen in a massive hard rubber holder.  Only slight bargaining ensued and the box was ours.  I pulled out the John Holland as that one was for me to keep!

A half hour later we began the long process of packing up and finally by 7:00 pm had the car packed and where on our way back home.  We pulled in to our driveaway around 3:45 am, enough to get a couple hours of sleep before my 6:30 am wake up call to go to work.

We get a couple months off now before our next show in January in Philadelphia, but boy, what a way to end the year!  A terrific show with lots of great pens, great food, and of course, good friends!  What are you waiting for, get to a pen show!

Cheers!
Brian & Lisa