Vintage Fountain Pens from the Flea Market

The Annex on 25th Street between 6th & 7th Avenues has about 75 dealers or more crammed into the ground and 2nd floors of a parking garage that is closed on weekends. This particular flea market has lots of vintage watches, costume jewelry, furniture, stamps, clothing--but I've never seen any pens.

I decided to go over today and just wander around, when suddenly the pens started popping up like mushrooms. My haul, from top to bottom:

Black Sheaffer Touchdown Craftsman with a 14kt #33 nib;

Pink and red marbled Wearever lever fill;

Blue Esterbrook dollar pen with a 2778 nib;

Pink marbled Waterman 3V.

The total came out to $90, or $22.50 a pen--decent but not a steal. But the vendors have to pay rent too, so I'm not going to complain. I have pens that I want in my collection, although none of these work and they'll be going off to various people for general repairs and more specialized work (the clip on the 3V has had it, that's not brass it's rust and re-plating will be necessary).

I'm hoping in the next few months, at the most by September, that I'll have them all restored and writing up a storm. For now, I just enjoy looking at them and feeling lucky that I even found them at the Annex. There were a few more I looked at but wasn't sure about, so perhaps next weekend I'll head back.