George Safford Parker
Founder of Parker Pen Company in Janesville; born Shullsburg
Net worth
$1 million
December 31, 1918
About
George Safford Parker founded the Parker Pen Company in Janesville in 1888 and turned a telegraphy teacher’s side hustle into the city’s signature manufacturer.
The Lucky Curve feed made the name travel; the Main Street factory became, in period boosterism, the largest pen works in the world.
Born November 1, 1863, in Shullsburg, Wisconsin, he came to Janesville to teach telegraphy, sold and repaired fountain pens on the side, and hated how they ruined shirts. He started the company in 1888, took a patent in 1889, and introduced the Lucky Curve in 1894. The first factory floor was the upper story of the Myers Grand Opera House at Milwaukee and Bluff in 1891; the firm incorporated in 1892 with W.F. Palmer as president and Parker as secretary-treasurer. He was still teaching while the first pens shipped. By 1908 a Main Street plant was drawing national notice. Janesville kept him when other towns offered deals. The plant moved to East Court and Division in 1920; at the peak Parker employed some two thousand people, second in town only to General Motors.
The Duofold (1921) was his era’s flashy seller. The Parker 51—the pen Eisenhower used on the German surrender and MacArthur on the Japanese—came after his death. He resigned the presidency in 1933, stayed chairman, and died in a Chicago hospital on July 19, 1937, at seventy-three. He is buried at Oak Hill in Janesville. The high school on the city’s southwest side carries his name. European buyers took the company in the 1980s; Janesville production ended in 1999.
Notable facts
He founded the Parker Pen Company in Janesville in 1888 and patented the Lucky Curve feed in 1894.
At its peak the Parker plant employed some two thousand people in Janesville, second only to General Motors.
He died July 19, 1937, and is buried at Oak Hill Cemetery in Janesville; a city high school bears his name.
What questions can this profile answer
- What makes George Safford Parker notable?
- George Safford Parker founded the Parker Pen Company in Janesville in 1888 and turned a telegraphy teacher’s side hustle into the city’s signature manufacturer. The Lucky Curve feed made the name travel; the Main Street factory became, in period boosterism, the largest pen works in the world.
- What is George Safford Parker's estimated net worth?
- George Safford Parker's estimated net worth is $1 million as of 1918-12-31.