You may be wondering what a 19th-century fountain pen has in common with today’s new releases; the answer lies in the mechanism that allows the ink to flow. The invention of this mechanism enabled pens to become successful self-contained writing utensils, marking a revolutionary moment in the history of human writing.
After feathered quills, the first major innovation in writing implements was the steel dip pen, which John Mitchell began mass producing in Birmingham, England, in 1822. These pens offered an improvement on the quill because the tip could stay sharp for far longer than a cut feather could (quills tended to last about a week). Unfortunately, a writer still had to interrupt the flow of writing to dip the pen in a bottle of ink, often leading to drips and blots. It was also inconvenient if you were a person on the move and had to carry a fragile inkwell with you.
The solution was obvious, and not only in hindsight—a smattering of patents for pens containing their own ink were issued in several countries in the 19th century, one of the first (if not the first) going to Frederick Fölsch in England in 1809. Even before that, records indicate that both the Fatimid Caliph Ma’ad al-Mu’izz li Dīn Allah in the 10th century and Leonardo Da Vinci in the 16th century had their own ink-holding pens, but neither instrument survived.
The invention of the modern fountain pen came about in 1883 when Lewis Waterman, a New York insurance salesman, grew exasperated with his pens’ propensity to leak and devised an effective system to regulate the flow of ink. To understand his design, it’s helpful to know the three main parts to a fountain pen: the nib, the feed, and the barrel.
The nib is the metal point that touches the paper. The barrel is where you hold the pen and where the ink is stored. The feed is the system that manages the flow of ink. Waterman was the first to develop a feed that released ink in thin rivulets, which allowed it to run through the nib by capillary action (the same force that draws liquid up between the bristles of a paintbrush).
Waterman’s design also included space to allow airflow into the ink reservoir to prevent air bubbles, which would cause ink to stop and spurt. Everyone could now write as consistently as with a quill without having to worry about replenishing ink for pages on end.
