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Mark Twain’s Conklin Crescent

By on May 27, 2024
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Samuel Clemens, better known as Mark Twain, owned this house with his wife Livy in Hartford, Conn.

Way back in 2013 I wrote a post called “Was Mark Twain the First Pen Pitchman?“. It was the oft repeated story about how author Samuel Clemens, who wrote under the pen name Mark Twain, advertised his support for the Conklin Crescent back in 1903. Clemens is best remembered for his novels “The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn” and “The Adventures of Tom Sawyer.” Plus there is the more relevant-than-it-has-been-in 100 years “The Gilded Age.”

I wouldn’t normally revisit an old post, but I just went to the Mark Twain House & Museum in Hartford, Conn. It is a beautiful house that he had custom built with his wife Livy (Olivia). Although Clemens was a noted writer and wit when they married in 1870, Olivia was the source of their wealth–the daughter of a prominent timber and coal baron. Their house in Hartford was built soon after their marriage. Remarkably, the young man who painted their foyer was none other than Louis Comfort Tiffany!

Clemens would write both Huck Finn and Tom Sawyer in that house.

At the bottom of the photo you can see the Conklin Crescent fountain pen that Mark Twain called his “profanity saver.” Above it to the right is his inkwell.

Among the many artifacts on display was the great author’s actual Conklin Crescent fountain pen. I am not sure what model it is. Yet, I was a bit appalled by its condition. Chunks of black hard rubber were missing from the barrel threads. It definitely isn’t in a condition to be restored to working order and safely used. Nevertheless, it was great to see the actual pen that is so frequently written about and rarely photographed.

If you find yourself in Connecticut, it is worth the visit to this museum. The house is very well preserved, and I certainly learned a ton about the author and his family.

Plus, his next door neighbor was Harriet Beecher Stowe who famously wrote “Uncle Tom’s Cabin,” a critical look at American slavery that helped to promote the abolition movement. Her house is now a museum you can explore, too!

Was Mark Twain the First Pen Pitchman?

By on November 18, 2013
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American author Samuel Clemens, who wrote under the pen name Mark Twain, was the spokesman for the Conklin Pen Company in 1903.

American author Samuel Clemens, who wrote under the pen name Mark Twain, was the spokesman for the Conklin Pen Company in 1903.

Samuel Clemens, better known to lovers of classic American literature as Mark Twain, was possibly the first famous person used to sell a specific make and model of pen.

Twain was the writer of “The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn,” “The Adventures of Tom Sawyer,” “Life on the Mississippi,” “A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur’s Court” and what might be my favorite “new” find of the year “On the Damned Human Race.” (I have yet to read it, but with a title like that it has serious potential.)

His pen of choice…at least when paid to say so…was the Conklin Crescent. In 1903 he was quoted as saying, “I prefer it to ten other fountain pens because it carries its filler in its own stomach, and I cannot mislay it even by art or intention. Also, I prefer it because it is a profanity saver; it cannot roll off the desk.”

You can see on this gold-fill Conklin circa 1900 the crescent that would keep the pen from rolling off Twain's desk.

You can see on this gold-fill Conklin circa 1900 the crescent that would keep the pen from rolling off Twain’s desk.

In addition to being the paid spokesman for Conklin, Clemens was the very first author to start composing novels on a new fangled invention called the typewriter. The novel was “Tom Sawyer.” Can you imagine writing a book that long with a pen? Can you imagine being the poor editors back in the day who had to decifer the handwriting in hundreds of manuscripts?

The Conklin Pen Co. was originally located in Toledo, Ohio. The unique part about it was that instead of an eyedropper or lever filler, it used an ink sac activated by a crescent protruding from the center of the hard rubber pen body. That crescent was connected to a flat metal bar that simply squeezed the ink sac. It was prevented from being accidently activated by a hard rubber ring that served as a safety that had to be spun to a clearing that would allow the crescent to be depressed.

Roughly a decade ago, the Conklin Pen Co. was revived. As part of their revitalization, the company restored the Crescent model to the selves of pen retailers. They even made a special model dedicated to Mr. Clemens.

At ThePenMarket.com we have an original early 20th century black hard rubber crescent filler and a much rarer gold-fill Conklin Crescent.