ink-pen

[sagehen]

>Bethany K. Dumas wrote:
>
>>The first time I heard someone say "ink pen" was here in Knoxville,
>>shortly after I came to UT (Fall 1974). The moment was memorable, for I
>>was in Glocker, which housed the computer center - back in the days when
>>if one wanted to use a computer one went to a computer center or a special
>>laboratory. I asked for something at the <service desk> and was told that
>>I would have to sign for it - then told that there was an "ink pen" I
>>could use.
>
>After some thought, I've realized that my own familiarity with the term
>'ink pen' comes from my early elementary school education in a Catholic
>parochial school (1957-62), where the nuns required us to write most
>assignments using what we commonly called an 'ink pen' (rather than
>ballpoint).  We had two alternatives:  the (then) old-fashioned 'fountain
>pen,' which had a mechanism for taking up ink refills from an ink bottle;
>or the new-fangled (and more popular with us) 'catridge pen', which was
>refilled by using small, plastic, ink cartridges.  (Both of these qualified
>as 'ink pens', while the forbidden 'ballpoint' pen did not, even though we
>might argue that it also contained ink.)  The nuns never felt a need to
>explain God's abhorrence of ballpoints, to my knowledge.  (We were
>allowed--perhaps required, I can't remember--to use pencil for mathmatics
>and perhaps some other writing activities). I doubt that this
>strictly-enforced code was specific to that particular school (in
>Washington, D.C.), but rather, expect that nuns everywhere (or at least the
>Sisters of St. Joseph) required it.  If it proves otherwise, my belief
>system will need yet another adjustment...
>
>I could go on to discuss how only certain colors of ink were acceptable,
>while others, such as the 'peacock blue' which we much prefered, were
>forbidden shortly after their introduction, but that's another story.
>
>Michael McKernan, Ph.D.
~~~~~~~~
I don't remember that we used "ink pen" in public grade school (1937-42),
but we did have "ink paper" on which we wrote (to distinguish it from the
"pencil paper," rather like newsprint).  The pens we used, supplied, as
everything else was, by the school, were straight dip pens with very fine
points which we dipped into the inkwells on our desks and conveyed,
dripping, to the paper to scratch a few more words, before repeating the
exercise. We had regular penmanship drills with these instruments of
frustration.  Inkwells typically collected bits of fuzz picked up by the
scratchy nibs and  deposited in the well  on the next dip.  Most of us
probably owned regular fountain pens (in those days with rubber ink
bladders inside which were refilled by a lever mechanismin the pen barrel),
but were not allowed to use them in school. I think I saw my first
ballpoint pen in 1946.
A. Murie

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