March 10, 2002	Sunday	Zilhaj 25, 1422

LOS ANGELES: The practice of putting pen to paper may be severely stunted, but it’s far from dead. People still use pens to take notes, write letters and append signatures to documents of all sorts. Of course the kind of pen used depends on the kind of person and the task at hand. Can you imagine President Bush signing an important treaty with a 79-cent ballpoint? Or the flashy Donald Trump inking an artful deal with less than an 18-karat-gold nib? Do corporate titans jot notes with pens less distinctive than they imagine themselves to be?

There’s a huge market for upscale and vintage pens judging from the glossy pen publications, or the high-powered pen activity on the Web — or from eavesdropping on the approximately 2,000 pen aficionados who attended the recent 14th annual Los Angeles International Pen Show.

These are not the sort of men and women who’d ever buy shrink-wrapped models at the market. They are collectors, folks who started with one fine pen and suddenly found themselves stockpiling as many as they could handle. If you’re imagining a group of fusty ink-stained codgers, you’re way off base. The place was jumping with technophiles so invested in the future that they seemed to have a heightened appreciation for the fleeting present and the hallowed past.

Many say they have thought long and hard about civilization, about the fact that knowledge has survived largely because it has been passed directly by hand, via writing on stone, then parchment and then paper. They are not about to let the tradition die.

Some of the 158 booths were showcases for top-of-the-line pen firms, but the real draw, the reason collectors travelled from 15 countries to be there, was to meet and greet pen lovers as passionate as themselves, with whom they could trade, sell and swap — or just brag a bit.

Chris Odgers, a show co-sponsor, is the director of technology at Warner Bros. He collects early Parker fountain pens, made in the 1890s to 1920s. His wife and little boy were with him at the table where he displayed elegant examples, some of which he was willing to sell or trade. Mostly, he was there to buy, he said. He kept his real treasures hidden beneath the display table in a plastic tackle box, each individually wrapped in cloth. Among them, a Parker “bullet pen” from 1917, used by soldiers to write letters home during World War I. It looks like a real bullet, but opens to reveal a nib.

There are two kinds of pen people, it turns out: those who collect to save, and those who collect to use. Many at the show were both kinds rolled into one. They own valuable vintage pens that they display but never use, and a different set they rotate for use on a daily basis.

“We’re all little kids in this room,” said Bert Hurlbut, a construction manager for the new UCLA medical centre building in Los Angeles. He was carrying some vintage pens from his collection so he could play a favourite game. “I go up to a guy and flop one of my pens on the table. He flops down a better one of his. I flop down an even better one of mine. We go on like this until he says, ‘You’ve got me.’ At that point, I’ve won.”

Hurlbut opens his jacket to reveal a shirt pocket packed with pens and two huge patch pockets sewn into the jacket on either side, each of which is packed with pens. They are individually wrapped in chamois and in little plastic bags. “I’ve got at least 30 in here, he says, patting a huge pocket. I’ve got one that’s astronomical — a Parker ribbon pen from 1905. And a Waterman filigree, 1911.”

Pen people never need to utter the word “pen” when referring to their stash. It’s always a specific make and style, as in: Parker “Big Red,” a Parker 51, a Pelikan Green, a Sheaffer Legacy. Hurlbut says he’s partial to Parkers.

The Parisian, Christophe Larquemin, wasn’t just buying. He was also hawking his own innovation: a limited-edition fountain pen made from a “genuine meteorite” mixed with powdered gold. ”There will be only 20 of these for the whole world. They will cost $6,000 each,” he said. To whom would he sell them? “Oh, there is no lack of buyers for such things,” he said. Scott Summerfield, a communications consultant from Newark, Calif., brought his son Zachary, 6, to the show. “This is my grandfather’s Parker 51, from the 1940s, with his name engraved on it,” the elder Summerfield said. Then his little boy piped up: ”I have a Pelikan, a Parker, a Sheaffer and a Waterman.”

Yes, but you’re not allowed to use pens in school — only crayons, right?

“I keep them at my house and use them there. I never take them out,” Zachary said. His father gives a fountain pen to all the children in Zachary’s and his older sister’s class every year. “They’ve never heard of fountain pens, never seen one, certainly never used one. I want them to know,” he said.

Norman Fenton, a retired judge, flew in from Tucson, Ariz., with his 15-year-old grandson. “I use pens, I save pens, I enjoy it all,” Fenton said. “I wanted to give my grandson a taste of it.”

Holding court was Susan Wirth of Milwaukee, a collector, seller and specialist “in pens that write a certain way.” Although her vocation is market research — “everything from ovarian cancer to lightweight concrete” — she says she’s known in the pen world as “an expert in nib extremes.” She fits pens with needle-grade nibs for super-tiny script, extra-broad nibs for more flamboyant writing, knows all about nibs for italics and other specialized tasks, she says. “This is a great postcard pen,” Wirth told an inveterate traveller. “This one’s not a beauty queen, but it’s a great performer,” she told a man who asked for “something dignified and simple” for everyday use. She cares not a whit for the exotic or unique — unless it really works. “Think how sad a little pen feels if it’s not doing what it was meant to do,” she explains.

One of dozens who flocked to her table was Dennis Lawton of Los Angeles, whose sentiments echo her own.

Lawton says he has 20 collectible pens and uses all of them. ”I sell insurance, and every day I use a different great pen. I wouldn’t own one I couldn’t use. I’ve already started my kids using pens. That’s because they use computers every day and they’ve lost all connection with paper. I want them to connect.” — Dawn/LAT-WP News Service (c) Los Angeles Times