Mackinnon's story is somewhat sad. After he patented this pen he started looking for someone to manufacture it for him. He made the mistake of showing the pen and leaving a sample with A.T. Cross. Cross studied the design and saw where a spring would improve the pen. He quickly patented this change and started manufacturing his own Stylographic pens. In disgust, Mackinnon contracted John Holland out of Cincinatti to manufacture these stylos for him. Mackinnon added the spring to his own design and was promptly sued by Cross for copyright infringement. Mackinnon died a few years afterwards of a heart attack.

Holland had a lot of problems with supplying the iridium for the MacKinnon contract. He first tried welding a tiny bead to the ink tube and then drilling through it. This worked but it was murder on the drill bits that broke at an alarming frequency. Then he hit on the idea of welding even smaller bits of iridium around the ring of the ink tube. The workers had to use microscopes to do this, but it saved a lot of drill bits and Holland patented the idea. But still finding enough iridium to fill this contract seemed impossible. It was then that Holland discovered a way to melt and fuse the commonly available iridium powder, something that earlier was considered due to iridiums ultra high melting point. (See my article "Iridium Kiss" in the Spring issue of the Pennant Magazine or write me for a copy)

Probably more interesting is Mark Twain's connection with this pen. While Samuel Langhorne Clemens is widely known by pen collectors for his endorsing Wirt and Conklin pens, few people know that he loved his Mackinnon long before the other pens were ever invented. From my research I have found that a friend of Twain's in Elmira NY(sorry I can not read the name in the letter from Mackinnon to Twain) was having a pen sent for repair to the Mackinnon Office in Brooklyn, NY, and in his letter he asked to include another Stylographic pen for Mark Twain who was presently staying at Quarry Farm in Elmira, NY. The Mackinnon Office quickly seized the opportunity to mail a stylo to Twain directly. I have letters in my possession written by Twain and to him from the Mackinnon Office, and I will publish an in depth article about Twain's pens in the near future.

Twain was one of the very earliest authors to own one of the pre 1865 fountain pens, probably a Prince Protean fountain pen, but I have not been able to doccument this. For a while it seemed that the world had known no greater boon since the invention of printing; but these early pens were dismal failures and when it clogged and balked, or suddenly deluged his paper and spilled in his pocket, he flung it out his window. After which, Twain received his Mackinnon Stylographic pen. He wrote to his friends Dr. Brown, to William Dean Howells, and to Rev. Joseph Twichell, urging its adoption. Even in a letter to Mrs. Howells he could not forget his new possession:

"...And speaking of Howells, he ought to use the Stylographic pen, the best fountain-pen yet invented; he ought to, but of course he won't -- a blamed old sodden-headed conservative -- but you see yourself what a nice, clean, uniform MS. it makes. "

And at the same time to Twichell:

" I am writing with a Stylographic pen. It takes a royal amount of cussing to make the thing go the first few days or a week, but by that time the dullest ass gets the hang of the thing, and after that no enrichments of expression are required, and said ass finds the stylographic a genuine God's blessing. I carry one in each breeches pocket, and both loaded. I'd give you one of them if I had you where I could teach you how to use it -- not otherwise. For the average ass flings the thing out of the window in disgust the second day, believing it hath no virtue, no merit of any sort; whereas the lack lieth in himself."

It was not easy to withstand Mark Twain's enthusiasm. Howells, Twichell, and Dr.John Brown were all presently struggling and swearing (figuratively) over their stylographic pens, trying to believe that salvation lay in their conquest. But in the midst of one letter, at last, Howells broke down, seized his old steel dip pen, and wrote savagely:

"No white man ought to use a stylographic pen, anyhow!"

Then, with the more ancient implement, continued in a calmer spirit. It was only a little later that Clemens himself wrote:

" You see I am trying a new pen. I stood the stylograph as long as I could, and then retired to the pencil. The thing I am trying now is the Wirt fountain-pen which is advertised to employ and accommodate itself to any kind of pen. So I selected an ordinary gold pen -- a limber one -- and had it cut and fitted to this thing. It goes very well indeed -- thus far; but doubtless the devil will be in it by tomorrow. "

Nevertheless, Twain used his Stylo well. He made revisions and additions to Tramp Abroad , and much of the original manuscript for Huck Finn was written with this pen.

A page from Chapter 2 of the "Tramp Abroad" manuscript, the start of "Baker's Blue-Jay Yarn." The chapter was penned with a MacKinnon Stylograph. The manuscript is part of the Bancroft collection.

Mark Twain signed Huck's signature on the last page with his stylo

Dr. John Brown
In mid-July 1873 the Clemenses left London for Edinburgh, "fleeing thither for rest and refuge," as Clemens later expressed it. There they met Dr. John Brown (the author of "Rab and His Friends," a popular dog story), with whom they developed a warm friendship. Here they are pictured with Dr. Brown, who, according to Clemens, had "the face of a saint at peace with all the world." Susy is in Clara's lap. Twain felt a special kinship with Dr. Brown and they used each other to develop ideas for each other's work.