street artist

Just watched this master of his craft at work , He was not as you would expect an artist to be, He was dressed in flamboyant bright yellow cloths, Headphones and wore gloves, His master piece took less than 15 minutes then he moved to another location and repeated his work, Which is good because, more people get to see his work and can enjoy the pleasure of seeing his skill in person and can and enjoy it for as long as they have time for,
He does't sell tickets or expects any payment, there is no 'Begging bowl' or tip jar, He does it on a contract with previous arrangements to cover his expenses and materials, Like all artistic work, Its not something anyone can do, He must have the basic aptitude for drawing and a medium level of spelling,

and then you can apply for this work

I would be no use at doing that, because me handwriting is terrible

Tommy tee, That tells me you missed the generation of skools with ink wells on the desks, we had to write using pens with nibs, ball point pens were not allowed and because of the way of having the right amount of ink on your nib, you had to control the speed of writing, If you got too little you ripped the paper. if you got too much on your page was full of spiders, The realy good hand writers work was a work of art and is highly sough after even today
the art of cursive writing

Tom

I was part of that generation, the school provided the pens, which were just a stick with a sharp nib on the end and a white ceramic inkwell in that round hole in the desk, or were they white ceramic inkpots and the inkwell was the hole in the desk? and they came along with blotting paper, and the ink was that awful dull drab colour, and the nib was as yoo say a very scratchy affair and that was during the 1960s.
But the school allowed you to use your own pen, so for Crimble you got a pen set, and if you were posh you got a Parker Pen Set and the other half decent Pen Sets for sale in places like Smiths were Platinum Pen Sets and you could have a Fountain Pen or a Cartridge Pen, and you would use Quink for ink, which was a nice bloo in colour, and the result of using a decent pen was remarkable, it really was better than that school provided stuff and towards the end of the 1960s, and because all the kids were using their own pens, they stopped using the school stuff unless you had no pen of your own.

Paper Mates came out later, which we weren't allowed to use and when I went to the Deanery, it carried on with that writing had to be done using a pen and ink, but after a year or two they started to allow ball points to be used, as long as they were decent ball points, BIC pens were frowned upon, but it depended which subject you were doing, English Language and English Literature still had to be written in pen and ink

yes Tommy tee, Its seems Ashton skools were more strict on the use of ball point pens, Another rule we had was ' NO SLANTY BACK JOINED UP WRITING' Writing had to be, straight or a slight leaning forward was allowed, Penalties were strict , lines or detentions or both and in some cases, A whacking was given,,

Tom

"A whacking was given"

Oh well if I had gone to Ashton Secondary School, which became Cansfield I would have been Whupsies mate and I would have gone deawn't pit wi him, but I'd a getten wack every day, because of my handwriting

I remember, at primary school. They had ink monitors. School did not buy ink, at least not as we know it.

Some powdered pigment was mixed with water, and the ink monitors filled and distributed those little ceramic inkwells to the desks.

They operated a 'protection racket'! If you did not pay up the tuppence, or so, as they demanded, they would give you a contaminated inkwell. Shredded blotting paper mixed up with the ink, so when you tried to write with those crude dip pens, the nib would splutter droplets of ink onto the page, creating a mess for which you would get caned.

There was several types of whacking at 'Eddy Arrows' where I went, the most serious was the headmaster, Mr harding but, It was a tickle compared to Greeny's whacking, he used a short sawn off bamboo with razor blades at the end ( they were actually splits of the cane) but hurt like razors, Then there was Northy whacks, he was the PT instructor so he packed a fair whack and then there was Mr Cosstello, A new modern thinking teecher who used to place us near a window and say quietly " pretend this hurts" then bring the cane down hard but missed your hand, He was the new breed of teecher and he supported the upcoming ban on corporal punishment movement which came in later, Too late for my year to appreciate

Tommy T, the pens you refer to earlier were Platignum, not Platinum, and I got mine when I was around 13/14. It had several nibs, including a couple for writing in italics which we were taught to do, and I enjoyed that particular part of English/Calligraphy lessons.

The old ink pots and pens with nibs were all we were given in school to each us how to write, and I don't want to sound big-headed when I say this, but I was already able to write before I went to school.

I remember clearly asking my mum for a pen and ink when I was around four because I wanted to copy words and, although concerned, she trusted me with a pen and a bottle of Quink in royal blue. Never spilled a drop!

I used to have nice handwriting, but since I had a TIA back in 2011, it has deteriorated, so not as nice as it once was.

The good old days, eh?

So you have the gift of Calligraphy Mollie, Yes it is a good thing and opens doors, I struggled with that form of penmanship which, now should be called 'Penpersonship' I was the kid with ink blots all over the page and spilled more ink than an outraged octopus

Mollie

It is all coming back to me now, and I remember italic nibs, they were slanted to one side if I am remembering them correctly, but I never used one, because it took me all my time to just write normally, and I only used ballpoints for me notes, I used pen and ink throughout my schooling, because my handwriting was a lot better if I used pen and ink, rather than a ball point, so all of me schoolwork for marking was done using an ink pen, including when I went into the sixth form, and during a chemistry lesson, which was being taken by a stand in teacher, we were doing work set by the chemistry teacher, which he had left for us, so it was homework for marking, so I was using a cartridge pen, and I was 17 at the time, but during the lesson I am sat on a stool in a chemistry lab, sucking on me pen, and writing out some chemistry stuff, which was proving hard to do, so it was write a line, then have a think and a suck on the pen, and then carry on writing, and I had been chewing and sucking pens for years, and been told off for doing so many times.
This particular day though and I am not sure how it happened, but the cartridge ruptured and I ended up with a squirt of ink in me gob, I didn't realise that on this particular pen there was a hole in the end of the pen I was sucking on, and I couldn't open me mouth to say anything, so I just ran out of the classroom and went to the toilets to wash me gob out with soap and water, and upon opening me gob, for some reason the ink had hit my front teeth and turned into a solid, and I don't know why that happened, but I managed to get the ink off me teeth, but my tongue was blue for the rest of the day

Tom I remember Mr Green he was our form teacher and lethal with the board duster. Mr Northey and his Son both played Rugby League I think for St Helens. There was Miss Jones PE Teacher who got married and become Mrs Smith or tuther way round . I saw Mr Costello around Ashton about 2years ago he had not changed much got older like the rest of us had a quick chat .You had to be a writer because most teachers were very quick to give you lines for any wrong doings. My writing is terrible and worse than a doctors.I either print a letter or type a letter even my signature changes,If I wrote my signature 20 times it would be different every time

I still use fountain pen for personal letters to friends and acquaintances. Just think it looks nicer.

Only send a handful or so a year nowadays.