Pen Trivia

Pen Trivia

Question: Many U.S. Presidents were prolific letter writers, especially our third president Thomas Jefferson. How many letters is it estimated that he wrote during his lifetime?

Answer: Thomas Jefferson (1743-1826) wrote nearly 20,000 letters in his lifetime. Writing was so important to him his need for quills caused him to breed geese solely for that reason.

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Pen Trivia

Question:
What is the difference between Cursive and Manuscript writing?







Answer:
Cursive writing - joins more than 50% of its letters
Manuscript (print-writing) - joins fewer than 50% of its letters.

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Pen Trivia

Question: How long is the longest hand written antique scroll?

Answer: According to Guinness Book of World Records, the longest hand written scroll in over 85 feet long. The paper scroll is from 1835 and is archived in India.

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Pen Trivia

Question: A pen by Thomas Edison is still used today. What is its purpose?





















Answer:  The first safe electric motor driven office appliance produced and sold in the United States was an electric pen, part of a complete outfit for duplicating handwritten documents and drawings. Thomas Edison filed a patent for his “Stencil-Pen” in 1876. The Stencil-pen was a commercial failure in its intended use of print duplication.

The invention received a reincarnation in 1891. Edison’s Stencil-Pen became a launching point for a newly defined industry. With Samuel O’Reilly’s modification to the inventions’ original design, the art of tattoos received a new boost in availability. O’Reilly expanded on Edison’s design, to allow the Stencil-pen to serve as a tool–injecting ink under skin instead of into paper.

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Pen Trivia

Pens have been used as props in motion pictures for years.

Director Stanley Kubrick was indeed ahead of his time, and no film shows that more than 1968’s “2001”. The effects for the time are rather remarkable. The film opens up with a simple pen floating in zero gravity. Today, you would be able to computerize it in. But in 1968 it was an impressive scene.

In the 1998 movie "Enemy of the State" with Will Smith and Gene Hackman there was a scene where Smith's character takes apart his Parker 51 looking for a tracking device.

The character Veronica, played by Winona Ryder, used a Montblanc pen to write in her diary in the teen favorite movie teen “Heathers”.

In “A Beautiful Mind” a young prodigy named John Nash (played by Russell Crowe) begins to develop paranoid schizophrenia and endures delusional episodes. Towards the end of the film he is being interviewed by a member of the Nobel Committee, when his Princeton colleagues present him with their pens. In others words, the pens are symbolic of the respect they have for the mathematical genius.

Question: What pen brand is predominantly featured in the “Breakfast Club”?































Answer: It was a Lamy Safari Ballpoint that Brian was putting up his nose in the movie “The Breakfast Club”.

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Pen Trivia

Translations can be a tricky thing. One needs to be mindful of all the idiosyncrasies of the language. Jolly Green Giant translated into Arabic, for example, means "Intimidating Green Ogre."

When the Parker Pen Company marketed a ballpoint pen in Mexico, its ads were supposed to say "It won't leak in your pocket and embarrass you." However, the company mistakenly thought the Spanish word "embarazar" meant embarrass. Instead the ad said that "It won’t leak in your pocket and make you pregnant."

Question: What pen company was retained by the British Royal household as the sole proprietor of inks and pens?



























Answer: The Parker Pen Company was awarded the Royal warrant as sole supplier of pens and inks to the British Royal Household in 1962. This is an honor to which it retains to this day.

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Pen Trivia - What date did man first land on the moon?

Pen Trivia

Of course a pen’s primary use is to write. Sometimes, however, they become magical instruments.

A Fisher Space pen earned its astronaut wings most famously during the Apollo 11 flight. An arming switch that allowed Buzz Aldrin and Neil Armstrong to lift off from the moon’s surface broke and they used a Fisher Space pen as a substitute lever earning a place in the official mission log and space flight history.

Questions: What date did man first land on the moon?

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Answer: July 20, 1969

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Pen Trivia

In recent weeks we have all learned some trivia about pens. What about the words they write?

Did you know the most commonly used letter in the alphabet is “E”?

Did you know the least used letter in the alphabet is “Q”?

Did you know the first letters of the months July through to November spell JASON?

Did you know the dot on top of the letter “I” is called a tittle?

Did you know 1 out of every 8 letters written is an “E”?

Did you know the word 'almost' is the longest in the English language with all the letters in alphabetical order?

Did you know the most commonly used word in English conversation is “I”?

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Pen Trivia: Rollerball Pens

Of course, choosing your pen is a personal preference, a subjective experience. Although rollerballs are the newest entry into the world of fine writing, with fountain pens and ballpoints paving the way, they gain more in popularity each year.

Rollerball pens were introduced in 1963 by Ohto Japan who were at the time known as Auto Japan. There are two main types of roller ball pens: liquid ink pens and gel ink pens. The first type uses an ink and ink supply system similar to a fountain pen and they are designed to combine the convenience of a ballpoint pen with the smooth "wet ink" effect of a fountain pen.

• Less pressure needs to be applied to the pen to have it write cleanly. This permits holding the pen with less stress on the hand, saving energy and improving comfort. This can also translate to quicker writing speeds. This is especially true of liquid ink pens.

• The inks usually have a greater range of colors due to the wider choice of suitable water-soluble dyes and/or to the use of pigments.

• They tend to write more clearly than ballpoint pens do.

Question: What fine writing pen brands has the best selling rollerballs?




























Answer: Lamy’s Al-Star, Safari and their 2000 lines are the top selling rollerballs.

http://www.penboutique.com/c-8-rollerball-pens.aspx?manufacturerid=18

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Pen Trivia - Contracts and Signing on the Dotted Line

Contracts have always required a signature to become legally binding. Typically, contracts are oral or written, but written contracts have typically been preferred in common law systems. Hand written permanent ink signatures are the usual mode of agreement. In this fast paced world of new technology an electronic signature is now also accepted.

If a contract is in a written form, and somebody signs it, then the signer is typically bound by its terms regardless of whether they have actually read it provided the document is contractual in nature.

To sign on the dotted line: Agree formally or fully, as in The deal is just about fixed; all they have to do is sign on the dotted line. This idiom refers to the broken line traditionally appearing at the bottom of a legal document, indicating the place for one's signature. [Early 1900s]

Using a fine writing instrument makes a statement of committed permanence when signing contracts that mark the important stages of our life such as buying a new home, purchasing your first car, filling out paperwork for a new job and filing for a marriage license.

Question: When and where was the first legislation created to acknowledge and require signed contracts?

Answer:  In 1677 England passed the Statute of Frauds which influenced similar stature of frauds laws in the United States and other countries such as Australia, which honoring signed and binding contracts.

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Pen and Ink Drawings

In fine art, the term 'pen and ink' denotes a drawing technique involving the use of black and other colored inks which are applied to a support (generally paper) with either a dip pen or a reservoir pen. This traditional, versatile media has been used by Western artists since ancient-Egyptian times, for sketches, finished drawings or ink and wash paintings. It is also one of the main mediums involved in book illustration.

 The development of ink truly revolutionized human life. Long before Gutenberg simplified the printing process, ancient cultures in Egypt, Greece and Asia used ink for creating handwritten manuscripts, religious and political documents and works of art. Ink provided people with a permanent means to keep records, create manuscripts and document the world around them. Ink as a sophisticated artistic medium developed sometime between the 7th and 8th centuries in China, where a range of subjects, from religion, history and daily life, were illustrated using brushes fashioned from animal hair and feathers. Applied to scrolls of paper or sheets of silk, these detailed works of art were forerunners to the approaching development of pen and ink drawings.

By the Renaissance, new tools were developed to enhance the precision and detail afforded by ink, such as wooden styluses and sharpened metal shards. Because of its permanence, ink drawings demanded practice and perfection. For this reason, many artists used this medium for their studies. Leonard Da Vinci created many detailed studies of human anatomy, mechanical inventions, as well as figure drawings, which exemplify the range of results possible with fine ink drawing. Ink was also used with other media, such as pencil, graphite, watercolor and chalks, and soon washes and highlighting techniques developed, providing additional effects to ink drawings, whether quick sketches or elaborate compositions.

Ink has been used for centuries to create meticulous compositions. In addition, realistic diagrams of the anatomy helped early doctors in the study of the human body. The printing of books advanced literacy and promoted language arts. As an artistic medium used by masters, such as Rafael, Rembrandt and Picasso, ink is a versatile medium that provides a permanent record of an artistic statement.

Question: How many “Pen and Ink” drawings did Leonardo Da Vinci create?





























Answer: Leonardo composed a minimum of 4,000 “Pen and Ink” drawings.

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Pen Trivia - Left Handed Writers and Nibs

Bias against left-handed people is discrimination, conscious or not, against people who are left-handed dominant. Approximately 10% of the world's population is left-handed. Yet many common tools are designed solely for use by right-handed people, making them difficult, painful, or unsafe for left-handed people to use. These range from simple objects such as scissors to dangerous machinery such as power saws. Even in relatively "modern" societies, left-handed people historically have been—and in some places still are—forced from childhood to use their right hands for tasks which they would naturally perform with the left, such as eating and writing.

Left-handed people who speak Arabic, Persian, Hebrew, or any other right-to-left script do not have the same difficulties with writing. The right-to-left nature of these languages prevents left-handers from running their hand on the ink as happens with left-to-right languages. Because writing when moving one's hand away from its side of the body can cause smudging if the outward side of the hand is allowed to drag across the writing, it is considered easier to write the Latin alphabet with the right hand than with the left. Furthermore, it is considered more difficult to write legible Chinese characters the left hand than it is to write Latin letters, though difficulty is subjective and depends on the person in question.

Left-to-right alphabets can be written smudge-free and in proper "forward slant" with the left hand if the paper is turned 1/4 turn clockwise (90 degrees to the right), and the left hand is drawn toward the body on forward strokes, and left to right on upward strokes (as expressed in directionality of the text). It is also possible to do calligraphy in this posture with the left hand, but using right-handed pen nibs. Otherwise, left-handed pen nibs are required in order to get the thick-to-thin stroke shapes correct for most type faces.

Luckily Pelikan and Lamy offer left-hand fountain pen nibs for the left-handed writer.
http://www.penboutique.com/pelikan-pens.html?cat=291
http://www.penboutique.com/search?q=pelikano+480

Pen Boutique carries many of Lamy’s left handed nibs including:
http://www.penboutique.com/lamy-pens.html?cat=215&type=435
http://www.penboutique.com/search?q=lamy+logo


Question: When was the first pen nib invented?




























Answer: The first pens were reeds, bamboo, and bird feathers (quills), and quills were used extensively from the 5th through the 1st century BC, notably for the Dead Sea scrolls. By 79 AD, Romans were using metal-nib pens dipped in ink.

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Pen Trivia : Match the song titles with the artist...

Writing letters has long been a popular theme in popular culture songs. Revealing your heart always seems a bit easier when penning your feelings. Let’s see how closely you have been listening about writing. Match the song titles with the artist who made the tune popular.

1.) Book of Love
2.) Mr. Postman
3.) Black & White
4.) Ink
5.) Take a Letter Maria
6.) Paperback Writer
7.) The Letter
8.) Lady Writer
9.) With Pen in Hand
10.) Every Day I Write the Book

1.) Dire Straits
2.) The Beatles
3.) Elvis Costello
4.) The Monotones
5.) Coldplay
6.) Three Dog Night
7.) The Box Tops
8.) The Marvelettes/The Beatles
9.) Vikki Carr
10.) R. B. Greaves






















Answers:
1.)  #4
2.) #8
3.) #6
4.) #5
5.) #10
6.) #2
7.) #7
8.) #1
9.) #9
10.) #3

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Pen Trivia : How many ball point pen are manufactured each year?

Pen Trivia

The principle of the ballpoint pen dates from the late 19th Century when patents were taken out by John Loud in 1888 for a product to mark leather and in 1916 by Van Vechten Riesberg. However neither of these patents was exploited commercially.  The modern version of ball point pen was invented by Josef (Lazlo) and Georg Biro.  In the summer of 1943 the first commercial models were made. The rights to Lazlo's patent were bought by the British Government. The ball point pen is more rugged than the fountain pen which may be why sales rocketed during World War II when the military needed robust writing implements to survive the battlefield environment.  The ballpoint pens was introduced to the U.S. market. The pen was sold for $9.75 each. Some 10,000 were sold at the launch at Gimbel's department store in New York on October 29th 1945. 

Ball points were originally conceived and developed as a cleaner and more reliable alternative to quill fountain pens and are now the world's most-used writing instrument.  Millions are manufactured and sold daily. As a result, it has influenced art and graphic design and spawned an artwork genre.

Q. How many ball point pen are manufactured each year?

Answer: Over three billion ball point pens are manufactured each year in a variety of styles, point sizes, materials and colors.

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Ferrari

The famous symbol of the Ferrari race team is the Cavallino Rampante ("prancing horse") black prancing stallion on a yellow shield, usually with the letters S F (for Scuderia Ferrari), with three stripes of green, white and red (the Italian national colors) at the top. The road cars have a rectangular badge on the hood (see picture at top of page), and, optionally, the shield-shaped race logo on the sides of both front wings, close to the door.

On 17 June 1923, Enzo Ferrari won a race at the Savio track in Ravenna where he met the Countess Paolina, mother of Count Francesco Baracca, an ace of the Italian Air Force and national hero of World War I, who used to paint a horse on the side of his planes. The Countess asked Enzo to use this horse on his cars, suggesting that it would bring him good luck. The original "prancing horse" on Baracca's airplane was painted in red on a white cloud-like shape, but Ferrari chose to have the horse in black (as it had been painted as a sign of grief on Baracca's squadron planes after the pilot was killed in action) and he added a canary yellow background as this is the color of the city of Modena, his birthplace. The Ferrari horse was, from the very beginning, markedly different from the Baracca horse in most details, the most noticeable being the tail that in the original Baracca version was pointing downward. The motif of a prancing horse is old, it can be found on ancient coins. A similar black horse on a yellow shield is the Coat of Arms of the German city of Stuttgart
Sheaffer Ferrari offers a variety of affordable pens sporting the Ferrari logo and they are a distinctive way to celebrate the brand.

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Pen Trivia

                                                                        Pen Names:  

A pen name is a pseudonym adopted by an author. It is used to make the author’s name more distinctive, to disguise his or her gender, to distance an author from some or all of his or her works or for any of a number of reasons related to the marketing or the aesthetic presentation of the work. The author’s name may be known only to the publisher, or may come to be common knowledge.  See if you can match the real names with the pen names!

Real Name

1.)    Stephen King

2.)   Samuel Clemens

3.)   Chloe Anthony Wofford

4.)   Anne Rampling

5.)   William Sydney Porter

6.)   Charles Lutwidge Dodgson

7.)   Daniel Handler

8.)   Allen Stewart Konigsberg

9.)   Eric Arthur Blair

10.) Mary Ann Evans

Pen Name

1.)    Lewis Carroll

2.)   Anne Rice

3.)   George Eliot

4.)   O. Henry

5.)   Woody Allen

6.)   George Orwell

7.)   Richard Bachman

8.)   Toni Morrison

9.)   Lemony Snicket

10.) Mark Twain

Pen name answers:

1.)    - #7

2.)   - #10

3.)    - #8

4.)    - #2

5.)   - #4

6.)   - #1

7.)   - #9

8.)   - #5

9.)    - #6

10.) - #3

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