One day Mr. George Kraker, who had traveled for the Conklin Pen Company, came along and convinced me that he could sell all the pens we could manufacture. He persuaded me to let him and Mr. Ben Coulson, who had also traveled for the Conklin Pen Company and was a good salesman, do the selling and ha e me do the manufacturing. A contract was entered into wherein I gave them 33-1/3% to do all the selling and I received all the rest. They opened an office in Kansas City in the Gumbel Building and they began to sell pens in June, 1912. The first sale was in Columbia Missouri, to the Missouri Store Company, a jewelry run by Claude Wheeler. The Missouri Store Company is still a fine representative of the Sheaffer Pen Company.

The Pens began to sell quite fast and we were having trouble manufacturing them. As the levers were made out of Monel metal and they were drilled with a little #69 drill, we broke thousands of drills. I went east and worked with the die makers and we had a terrible time in those days to set a die made to strike up a lever that we could drill readily. We also had a great trouble in getting a pencil clutch made that would holes an over-sized lead and then take an undersized lead. As the standard sized of leads was .0465, when the molds were made they were made so that they would be a little undersized and then the molds would wear more in some places then in others and the size of the leads would vary and we would have leads from .0455 to .047. The only temper given those clutches was that given we struck them up and they were made of high-brass. When you put an .047 lead into a pencil and the would follow with an .0455, the clutch would spread until the smaller lead would drop out. We kept working on a machine until we developed a machine there in the factory that would take a ribbon of Monel metal and make up nearly fifty thousand clutches in eight hours. The machine is still in operation today and we can run it only a fraction of the time. But this gave us a wonderful clutch that would hold any-sized lead and with the sturdy pencil we made, it gave us a splendid reputation for a fine pencil.

Kraker and Coulson whished to become interested in the manufacturing. I wished to have them interested, for I couldn’t afford to pay 33-1/3% for selling. On January 1, 1913, we incorporated for $35,000. It was agreed that I should always have 51% of the stock and that Kraker and Coulson should have 40% of the stock. Coulson couldn’t raise the money, so he went to Abilene, Texas, to see his brother, He needed $5,000 to finish his 20%; but his brother argued and said: “Ben, you are now 40 years of age and you have made no money. You have never shown the ability to make money or to save it. What assurances have I that you can pay this back?” Coulson came home very disheartened. I had never seen his brother, but I sat down and wrote him a letter. As a result of that letter, he sent back a check to his brother for $5,000. I felt that the was Coulson acted later in the deal, he didn’t appreciate this effort on my part very much.

The first year we did a nice business and our profits were $17,500, as I remember or something near this figure, showing about 50% profit on out invested capital. Now, it was in the written agreement that I should always have 51% of the stock and that Kraker and Coulson should always have 40%. But we had to take in some outside money and Mr. Brewster, a banker and good friend came into our company. As we were letting these outsiders in, I told Kraker and Coulson that it would cut their interest to 35% if I kept my 51%. They agreed that they should have their interest cut to 35% It was very difficult for me to keep 51%, but I was determined to do so. As we had a written agreement that they should have 40% and as this new arrangement was only an oral agreement that they would have their interest cut to 35% and we were putting the money in quickly because this was in December and we had to get ready for the first year and had to spend this money right away, I didn’t think it was necessary for me to have my two partners put the new agreement down in writing. Of course, that is where I made a mistake.

When we got the money all in, Kraker and Coulson saw they had me. Then they insisted on the written agreement being lived up to, that they should have 40%. If they got 40%, it would cut me down to 46% or less than control. Well, as Mr. Kraker was our vice president and Mr. Coulson was our treasurer, I said: “Boys, this is crooked. Before I will stay in partnership with men who are crooked, I will liquidate the assets of the company and pay the stockholders what is coming to them.” After this conference I walked home with Ben Coulson. As Mr. Kraker had been the man who had been doing all the talking, I said to Mr. Coulson as we waked along: “Ben, what are you going to do?” Are you going to stick by your word?” He said: “I will let you know in the morning.”

When two men are crooked, they are suspicious of one another. As Kraker and Coulson had a clause in our contract that it took 75% of the voting stock to change the salaries, Kraker thought I was trying to buy Coulson’s 20% of stock so I could change the by-laws and obliterate this unfair contract. I no more than got home than the phone rang. Mr. Kraker was on the phone: “I would like to see you.” I said: “All right.” He came down and said: “Will you buy my stock?” I said: “Yes.” He said: “Will you give me $150 a share for it. We have earned 50% this year.” I said: “Yes.” So I bought his stock and let Mr. Brewster have a portion of it. Then, of course, I canceled this contract which had tied me down so that I couldn’t change salaries in the business without the acquiescence of Kraker and Coulson. Mr. Brewster was a wonderful friend and a very straightforward business man, but he got scared pretty easily.

Mr. Kraker came to us one day and said: “I know you have no use for me.” I said: “No, I haven’t, George. You can never work in the office again. I wouldn’t trust you with money at all.” He said: “I have a plan whereby you won’t have to trust me. You know my old territory for the Conklin Pen Company was Kansas, Missouri, Nebraska and part of Colorado. I wont you to enter into a contract with me to sell Sheaffer merchandise at 10% above cost for this territory for only 10 years. I will furnish the show cases and all the expenses of building up this trade in this territory and if I don’t build it up, I can’t make any money. I will pay you cash in advance before you ship the goods, and you know I can sell the goods. I will build this territory to a fine business in ten years and then it will be all built up for you. The show cases will all revert to you and you will have this territory in fine shape, and you will have all the rest of the United States to sell in.”

I didn’t want to have anything to do with him, but Mr. Brewster found that he had a brother in the saloon business in Illinois who was quite well off and that they really has more money than we had. Mr. Brewster thought that if we didn’t enter into this contract they would start a competing company and cause us lots of trouble. So finally I acquiesced, only to find that they had entered into this contract for the purpose of keeping us out of this territory and had actually started the Kraker Pen Company in Kansas City, Missouri, with $50,000 capital. They had hired my superintendent to swear that he was the inventor of my lever pen. I understand they gave him $3,000 for doing this, but I can’t verify this.

They started an interference suit in Washington against us to take our patent away from us and attempted to use this contract to keep us out of the territory there were going to build up their business in. But they didn’t go into the legal part of it qite strong enough. Our attorney told us that they couldn’t use that contract because since they had started in business, it was illegal. We then went into court and cancelled the contract and then a long series of law suits and fighting started. It took, I believe, almost 3-1/2 years of litigation before we finally validated our lever patent that they tried to take away from us. They had an attorney by the name of Lotz, of Chicago, and we had Frank Brown, of Chicago. Frank Brown as I formerly have said, was a very splendid attorney and very painstaking in his work.

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