Inkograph Marketing Materials

Various Inkograph Marketing Materials from the 1920s.

We acquired these Inkograph marketing materials a while back but we've cleaned our desk off and we're wading through the backlog. If you're not familiar with Inkograph, it was a New York firm run by William and Joseph Wallace beginning around 1914. For more background on Inkograph as a company, we recommend this article by Danny Watts at Chronicles of a Fountain Pen and Jim Mamoulides has some more info in this piece at Pen Hero.

The postmark on the envelope has no date but we are guessing early- to mid-1920s for this marketing campaign. We noticed the receipt booklet has a date field for the year as 192_, and it wouldn't make sense to print it like that unless there was a lot of time left in the 20s decade. 

Inkograph branded envelop with the Inkograph logo and two New York 1 1/2 cent stamps

The introductory letter below has a larger version of the Inkograph masthead and has the slogan "The only really successful fountain pencil has an automatic feed which prevents point from clogging." Above the masthead  it shows J. Wallace, Pres. & Treas. , then W. F. Wallace as Vice Pres. and finally L. Kiebel as Secretary.

The letter thanks the recipient for requesting a catalog and explains that everything he needs to start making money selling pens is included. It also explains that, as it would be terribly difficult to sell Inkograph fountain pens without actually having one to show the prospective customer, they have taken the liberty of shipping him a No 31X pen at a 1/3 discount. If he didn't want it, all he had to do was refuse it when the postman delivered it. It later explains how they will give him a display case for free when he buys all the pens in it. It's a really wonderful read.

Inkograph sales letter, page 1

Inkograph sales letter, page 2

They have included an eight page, two-color catalog, filled with technical details about the pen and how it works. It has some very nice actual size illustrations of the Inkographs pens and the Wallace fountain pens, as well as the Leadograph wonder pencils. The back cover shows the Inkograph Mermaid desk set. 

Inkograph Catalog Page 1

Inkograph Catalog Page 5

Inkograph Catalog Page 2

Inkograph Catalog Page 6

Inkograph Catalog Page 3

Inkograph Catalog Page 7

Inkograph Catalog Page 4

Inkograph Catalog Page 8

Also included was a receipt book and a sample envelope with sheets of Inkarbon carbon paper.

Inkograph receipt booklet

Inkarbon carbon paper booklet

Here's the front and back of the price list. 

Inkograph price list, front

Inkograph price list, back

There's also a nice brochure touting the benefits of Permex, "A Forward Step in Writing Fluids." Here it is, front and back.

Permex ink brochure, front

Permex ink brochure, back

Lastly, we're including this wonderful "how to be a successful salesman" style brochure, containing a "A number of well-prepared, scientific sales plans by an expert who has made Selling a Life Study." This brochure is 24 pages, so we'll include it here as a slideshow where you can flip through the individual pages. If you click play, each page will display for five seconds. Or, you can just use the arrows to go back and forth at your own pace.

Vintage Inkographs are not that hard to find, and several of our club members have one or more in their collection.