on June 14, 2025, 11:40 pm
Jack was a long-time fountain pen enthusiast, collector repair person and fellow Chicago Pen Club member. Unfortunately Jack passed away recently at 95 years of age.
What excited Jack was to mess around in his home shop where he would repair, analyze filling systems and mess around with new creations.
Jack was good friends with Brian Gray of Edison Pen and often traded ideas about new concepts. Back in 2010 Jack showed Brian a Blow-Filler concept. Brian never put this concept into his product line up but he make a prototype as a favor to Jack. The material is original Sheaffer Cebloplast which is now extinct. Quite amazing and likely the most rare Edison pen ever produced. This pen was sold at the recent Chicago Pen Show auction.
Read Brian Gray’s article about this pen
https://edisonpen.com/index.cfm/2010/07/06/a-blow-filler-a-blow-filler/
Edison Draw-Filler, introduced 2017
Furthermore Jack designed what Brian now calls his Draw-Filler. It’s like a piston filler, maybe a vac filler, no spring, but…the user would manually depress and lift the piston several times for a complete filling. This method would provide a more complete fill of ink than many other formats. Brian liked Jack’s idea. Jack had produced that filler in anodized aluminum up to the present day. Clever idea, it works, simplifies the filling mechanism with character and improved performance.
Read Brian’s article about the Draw-Filler
https://edisonpen.com/index.cfm/2017/05/17/new-from-edison-the-draw-filler/
Yes, Jack was quite a clever and creative tool man in the pen tool shop. Scroll up this page for another of my articles on a custom hand made vac fill, cartridge or ink dropper pen that Jack hand made and gifted to me.
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