The Big Poppa

It was almost a year ago, while perusing the “pen” Instagram, I saw a big honking pen made by Shawn Newton of Newton Pens. It was a Knickerbocker. And unlike that team from New York, this is a winner. I had never seen anything quite like it. It was made from an industrial plastic called Ultem. It had a chonky cap. It used a Bock 380 nib. And on top of that it was a piston filler. Most importantly, it reminded me of yellow cabs. Don’t ask me why, but it did.

A few months later, when attending the San Francisco Pen Show (2025), I asked Shawn if he still made that version of the pen. No, as that was part of a small batch production for a group buy. He said he might have some leftover parts and if he did, he would be happy to make me one.

A few months later, he emailed to let me know that I was in luck, and he found a few parts as one of the group buyers had decided to not buy the pen. My question to him was — can we create a black Ultem cap instead of the yellow Ultem cap? He did say yes, and warned me that the rings would be lost in black. I didn’t think they would. I was willing to take a risk.

The next tweak was to get rid of the silver clip, and instead go for a darker ruthenium-colored clip. A month or two later, the pen showed up at my place. I installed a vintage oblique triple broad Montblanc 149 nib in the pen, inked it up with Aurora Black. I should have been all set, but there was one more thing.

The Nib.

I needed a special, bespoke nib. And that’s when, out of the blue, Sally Smith from Sallymander Nibs pinged me. She was trying to make a stack out of Moonman #8 nibs and asked if I was interested. Was I interested? Of course, I was. But could she do it in black, and with a special grind that I prefer for long periods of writing?

Long story short, a month and a half later, the three-layer stacked nib arrived. Next step was to acquire a Bock 380 unit, remove the original Bock steel nib, and replace it with my nib. Mike’s Pen Fun and Kirk Speer made that happen.

Meet the Big Poppa.

The pen that is my daily writer. It is big, it’s muscular, but it’s not heavy. It does the job. It is what I am using to write my book. It reminds me of the old yellow Ambassador taxis that would occasionally flit across the once uncrowded roads of my hometown and puts a big smile on my face. It was worth the time, effort, and the money.

February 24, 2026