Editing The Pen Addict 317/transcript (section)

== Estabrook Pens ==


'''Jessica Coles:''' But, um, yeah, I, I was just on pins and needles waiting for him to come back and, uh, got it. And I don't know, everything just opened up there. I knew what I wanted to do.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' Um, so what I find the most fascinating, what draws you in with Estabrook is the colors for me, the barrel colors, but what sells the Estabrook and what's really like the key, I think, to the brand as a, as a popular vintage brand are those nibs, right? How many, do you have any clue? Like the total number of nibs that they created? I mean, it's like, it's hundreds, right? It's like a

'''Jessica Coles:''' couple hundred or more. Well, um, in the 1800s, they were the leaders in making dip nibs. Okay. And they have hundreds of those. Um, they had the numbering system, but you could buy all kinds and they were making them also specific for various, um, uh, career types, um, judges, probate, um, teachers, students, um, everything in between. And when fountain pens started becoming popular in the 1930s, maybe it could have been a little bit earlier, but as far as I know, it was the early 1930s, they went and, uh, transferred their knowledge of all of those nib types into, uh, fountain pen nibs. And since their specialty was the different types of nibs, they pulled that in with them and wonderfully, I think made them in units so that you could easily change them out into anything you wanted. And with fountain pen nibs, about 40 are the most common ones, but there's all kinds of others. And there's some that you only see a couple of times in your life, even if you're searching for

'''Brad Dowdy:''' them and they're just mythical because they're so rare. So someone like myself who likes a very firm, very fine nib, there's something for me. Right. And then someone who likes a wider, wetter nib, there's something for them too. Right. And these are all swappable in and out of different barrels. I guess they're not totally universal, right? Or are they mostly?

'''Jessica Coles:''' They are actually. Okay. Um, any of their nibs fit on almost any of their units. Um, it's amazing.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' Yeah. That's crazy. So if you're putting together the Jesse Esther Brook, what are you picking for

'''Jessica Coles:''' your barrel and what are you picking for your nib and why? Okay. Um, so I enjoy some of the, uh, less common Esther Brooks, um, like the deluxe model or the, um, even the CX 100, uh, that are harder to find, but they look a little more, um, striking. They make you look a couple of times, uh, instead of just glancing over them. But I also like the J and LJ models because when they are polished, it,

'''Brad Dowdy:''' I guess the word is shit toyance. My least favorite word on the, on the planet. Yes. Thank you for that. There's, there's other words. I'm just kidding. There are. There are. I just, I like to have fun with that one, but yes, they, it's like this shiny shimmery effect and it's this depth that you just can't really focus on, but it's there. Like you see this weird depth in the pen and it looks beautiful.

'''Jessica Coles:''' Absolutely. And it, you can turn it and it distracts you terribly. And, uh, they're just gorgeous, but I have a dark Brown or it's called root beer, um, in LJ and J, which LJ is just the slimmer version of the J. Um, I use those all the time. And one of my favorite nibs is 9788, which is a medium flexible, but it's also getting very rare and hard to find right now. And I also like a very extra fine point, um, with a 2550. It's firmer and it's, uh, an incredibly smooth, fine point.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' I want to say, I, I should have looked at the nibs that I have before I talked to you, but 2550 sounds familiar as long as it's not some super rare one that I'm making up. It seems like that might be one that I have. Nope. It's not super rare. Yeah. Yeah. So I think I have 2550. Um, is there something in like the Estherbrook vintage world that would be like your perfect pen that you don't own? Like, is there some magic Estherbrook out there that, you know, one of these days you hope to

'''Jessica Coles:''' own one of? Yeah. Um, I would love to get into the cracked ice. Ah, nice. I was gonna say,

'''Brad Dowdy:''' maybe you don't want to say it because then someone, you know, will see it and buy it and then like try to sell it to you for a higher price. No, that's already happened. I think I've, I think I've seen pictures of those cracked ice. Were they, was one of them yellow?

'''Jessica Coles:''' Yeah, there's yellow and there's a beautiful blue one. And, um, I have the burgundy it's, I it's Moroccan red and I have a set of those and they're gorgeous. Um, Nick found those for me. Oh, nice. Uh, so those are ones that I keep my eye open for, but they're quite a bit more expensive than the, uh, everyday Estherbrooks, but also I adore the pastel pens, the purse pens.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' Yeah. So those are the little tiny ones. I've been tempted. I I'm starting to see some of those recently and I've been tempted because I like smaller pens. One of the reasons why I like Estherbrook because they're not a necessarily like a huge big body pen. Um, I mean, I like them for the nibs mostly, but they feel really, really good in my hand. Like I enjoy writing with an Estherbrook more than just like a common, uh, vintage pen, like a Parker 51 or a Parker vacuumatic. They fit my hand and feel a little bit better. And then I get the bonus of having like a really great nib. That's kind of almost tailor-made to me, you know, cause I have so much choice to that. So for people who aren't aware of, you know, Estherbrooks and they walk up to your table, what's, can you give me like a basic general starter price range? If you want to put together a pen barrel and a reasonably common nib to get like a really good restored, restored by Jesse hashtag, um, Estherbrook pen at a pen show.

'''Jessica Coles:''' Well, um, yeah, I have a base price with the pens. Um, and I, I sell them for $45 and it, it comes with one of the more standard nibs, the 1000 series. So that gets you medium, fine, medium, fine, or extra fine. Um, and then I credit you $5 towards the cost of any of the other nibs. Um, I have all of the nibs priced based on, uh, availability and demand that's out there. So of course the flex nibs are wildly in