Sheaffer

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Sheaffer is a brand of pens owned by the BIC Corporation.

Sheaffer is a pen company that manufactures writing instruments including ballpoint, fountain and rollerball pens and mechanical pencils. Sheaffer is famous for making fountain pens, especially the “school” lineup. They also produce calligraphy sets as well as other types of writing instruments. Sheaffer's trademark is a white dot. Sheaffer's fountain pen ink is called “Sheaffer Skrip”.

Many of Sheaffer's pen range are characterized by the classic Sheaffer inlaid nib. Sheaffer has developed several different filler systems for their fountain pen, such as the Touchdown® Filler (introduced in 1949), and, in 1952, the Snorkel® extending filler tube, both of which allow for bottled ink to be used without dismantling the pen.

The company was founded by W. A. Sheaffer, who designed (in 1907) and patented (in August of 1908) a pen filling apparatus that used levers. In 1912, Sheaffer used his life savings to start the Sheaffer company, which started with seven employees and operated in the back of a Fort Madison, IA jewelry store. On January 1, 1913, the W. A. Sheaffer Pen Company was incorporated with an initial investment of $35,000.

In 1922, the company introduced its own line of bottled inks, for use with its fountain pens. Called Sheaffer Skrip® ink, it was intended to flow more smoothly and blend more easily than other formulations of ink. In 1924 Sheaffer produced jade green pens made of a material Sheaffer called Radite. Prior to that time most fountain pens were black hard rubber. The introduction of colored pens proved popular and by 1925 Sheaffer had captured 25 percent of the U.S. pen market. Sheaffer maintained this market share throughout the years of the Great Depression. The Sheaffer White Dot® trademark first appeared in 1924 on the Jade Green Radite flat-top fountain pen.

In 1938, Sheaffer introduced the Crest™, the world's first pen with a plastic body and a fitted metal cap. Other well-known models include the Balance®, the PFM™, the Targa by Sheaffer™, the TRZ™, the Connoisseur®, the Prelude®, the Javelin® and the Nostalgia™.