Oh, patents! A. T. Cross crayon holders

Copyright © Françoise Herrmann

In US 296539 A.T. Cross discloses one of his crayon (or lead) holder inventions, and by the same token, some important steps in the birth of what are now called mechanical pencils.

The problematic situation addressed in the Cross lead or crayon holder patents concerns the mechanically-driven ejection of unused crayon (or lead) stubs. In other words, once most of the lead has been used and screwed down through the tube bore, and there is just a stub left, located inside or flush with the outer edge of the crayon tube, how do you remove it from the plunger jaws of the lead carrier, without having to reverse, steps, retracting (or screwing) the stub back up to the top, and removing it manually through the top of the pencil?

The mechanically-driven solution that Cross provided is a spring soldered to a forcer (called a “plunger” elsewhere, and corresponding to that part of the lead carrier which pushes the lead as it is being gradually used and screwed down through the pencil barrel). 

The spring is soldered to the bottom of the forcer to prevent it from "escaping", and it is actuated by a clever pin, slot and spur design, triggered as the user screws the lead down --just that one notch further.  

The spring forcer pin further includes a cam function that forces the lead holder jaws to open laterally, thereby immediately releasing the lead stub, which the spring in turn also propels further down the barrel, so that it may be removed through the lower part of the pencil holder.  

Thus, it is only for re-inserting a new lead, that the movement of the screw will have to be reversed so as to bring the lead carrier back up to the top of crayon holder. 

Below, the figure drawings 1-6, extracted from US296539, are included.

For comprehension and translation purposes, you will definitely want to initially key the illustrations --just as A.T. Cross does in his handwritten Canadian patents (e.g. CA10451, CA10682, CA17448, although not for the same reasons... 

It is otherwise helpful to know, per the patent specifications,  that all the lettering is consistent from one illustration to another. I have included such a key for the US296539 illustrations (1-6), which was directly layered onto to the extracted illustrations.  

Oh, patents! Alonzo T. Cross fountain pens, stylographs and mechanical pencils

Copyright © Françoise Herrmann

In 2016, and since 1971, the Cross™ Company [ATX], specializing in fine instruments of writing, is a publicly traded company on the NASDAQ  stock exchange.

150 years ago, circa the 1880s, Alonzo T. Cross, son of the founder of the Cross™ Company, incorporated in Providence, Rhode Island in 1846, applied for a series of US Letters Patent. The Letters patent were awarded for the invention of fountain pens, also called stylographic pens, mechanical pencils or crayon holders using endless screws, and the enameling or “japanning” of hollow articles such as pencil or crayon holder tubes. Two fountain pen patents were also filed and granted in Canada. The Canadian patents are handwritten documents with annotated drawings.

The French titles given to the Canadian Cross™ patents are respectively: Perfectionnements aux plumes-fontaines for Improvements on fountain pens (1879 CA10682) and Plume-fontaine for Fountain or reservoir pen (1883 CA17448), thereby adding yet another quilled French term for “fountain pen” and the English variation “reservoir pen”.

The term “japan” for “enamel” and corresponding verb form “japanning” in US303817 is also noteworthy!  The patent disclosed improvements to the art of enameling small hollow surfaces such as crayon or pencil tubes.

The following is a list of the Alonzo T. Cross fountain pen, mechanical pencil and japanning patents, awarded in the US and Canada:

1873 US140477 Pencil cases

1877 US189304 Fountain pen

1878 US199621 Fountain pen

1878 US209959 Fountain pen

1879 CA10682  Inprovements on fountain pens / Perfectionnements aux plumes-fontaines [Handwritten document]

1880 US225691 Stylographic fountain pen

1880 US227416 Stylographic fountain pen

1880 US229305 Fountain pen 

1880 US232804 Stylographic Pen

1881 US244194A Stylographic pen

1882 US263392 Lead and crayon holder

1883 CA17448 - Fountain or reservoir pen / Plume-fontaine [Handwritten document]

1894 US296537 Crayon holder

1884 US296539 Crayon holder

1884 US303624 Stylographic fountain Pen

1884 US303817 Method of enameling or Japanning hollow articles

1897 US595373 Fountain Pen

1900 US657483 Fountain pen

1901 US714283 Fountain pen

1908 US900833 Fountain Pen

Click on the hyperlinked patent numbers to see the ornate and beautiful technical drawings of the Cross™ fountain pens, mechanical pencils and crayon holders!