Fine Writing - Stylus Magazine

and precious metal pens. most of
their production at that time, however,
was for private labels, so early
examples of the company’s production
are as rare as throngs of noisy
tourists are in the company’s founding
city today. the marzotto family
acquired majority interest in the
company in 1921.
bassano was a center of military
operations during World War
I, and elmo-montegrappa pens, as
they were then called, were popular
among servicemen. Interestingly,
a local villa near the factory, villa
Azzalin, was converted to a field hospital
to attend to the demands of the
war, inadvertently weaving ernest
Hemingway into the company’s early
history. the famed American writer
had volunteered for service as
an ambulance driver for the Italian
red cross, thus bringing him to
the region. He purportedly used the
company’s pens for his correspon-
30 october/november 2003 s t y lu s
dence and even visited the factory
on occasion. the company’s eventual
adoption of the name montegrappa
directly recalls the epic defense of
mount Grappa by Italian forces dur-
ing that war.
early on in the firm’s journey from
regional artisan to global acclaim,
it used “new” materials to craft
its pens. celluloid, a highly flammable
mix that included camphor
and pyroxylin, and galalith, made
from casein, were popular. And the
cutting-edge approach exhibited in
choice of materials was practiced in
design, color and technology during
this very creative period in the company’s
history, the years between the
world wars.
because of its strategic location,
bassano del Grappa was heavily
involved in military operations during
World War II, and many materials
used by the small pen maker were
either destroyed or diverted to the
war effort. Surviving this devastation
and once again gearing up production,
the company endured further
insult in the form of a fire in the celluloid
store in 1946 that destroyed an