PA U L E . W I RT
By
George A. Turner

In “The Passing Throng” a regular column

that appeared years ago in The Morning Press,
on December 10, 1938, there appeared a letter
written by Wesley Wirt, a Civil War soldier, to his
son, Paul Estherly Wirt.
The father, the
commissary sergeant of the 171st Pennsylvania
Volunteers, a nine months regiment, wrote the
letter while stationed at New Bern, North
Carolina, on March 27, 1863. Fearing that he
might die in the war, he wanted to share some
fatherly advice with his thirteen-year-old son
whom he held in high regard.
Wesley Wirt, born in Espy and forty-two
years old, was much older than the average
soldier. In his early years he taught school in
New Jersey and later established a school in
New Columbus, Huntington Township in Luzerne
County, that subsequently became a successful
academy. At the age of thirty-one he decided to
leave teaching to study law under attorneys John
Cooper and Charles R. Buckalew and became a
member of the Columbia County Bar. He and his
wife, Susan, were the parents of six children:
Paul, William, Florence, Rueben, Augusta, and
Charles. Two of their children, died at the age of
three, Rueben in 1860 and Augusta in 1861.
The Bloomsburg Town Council elected him in
1873 as its secretary, which he held until his
death on April 25, 1878. The letter follows:
Dear Paul:
You are now arrived at an age when you can
begin to understand something of life, and when
you should begin to examine intelligently whether
or not you are as well prepared as other boys
have been for the great contest in which all men

have to engage. For a real contest you will
find it if you live to the age of your father.
I have great confidence in your integrity,
Paul. I know you to be an honest, as well as
a sensible, boy; and unless something has
changed, or does change, this early
character of yours, you will come to be a man
respected by the world and by yourself, which
latter is of more importance than most people
imagine. I do not propose to read you a long
homily on the value of goodness, for most
youths hear so much of this from inconsistent
Sunday School teachers and ministers, and
have it thrust before them so often in their
schoolbooks, that they are apt to become
disgusted - not with piety and morality
themselves, but with the constant prating
thereof. I only wish to give you my opinion as
a man of the world and as your nearest
friend, except your mother, in the world. I do
not propose to treat as most fathers do their
sons, to give you cold and distant advice and
imperious directions. It is as a friend and
younger companion that I shall always treat
you. This I desire to have impressed on your
mind that yo may be self-reliant and fearless,
and actuated by the highest of motives; for as
to positive punishment, you will, I think, never
receive any from me, unless, in cases of
dereliction of duty to yourself or to society,
you will consider the disapprobation and
indignant astonishment of your father as
such. We all have faults and your father and,
perhaps yourself, have grievous ones; but
this should not hinder us while we strive in

2

our love for correct principle to correct these
faults from holding up our heads like men. For to
err is human. As Burns says, “A mon is a mon
for a’ that.”
Now then, Paul, (and I hope the advice is
not necessary), make a man of yourself. This is
to be done by education and the education I
speak of is acquired by habits of thought and
reflection, by observation and reading. These
with the love for what is proper and honorable,
and a due respect for yourself, will do the work.
Mind, I stick for self-respect; for I have no
patience with this feigned humility which is so
fashionable among hypocrites. One man is as
good as another, especially if he knows as much,
as is as honorable and high-minded as the other.
I may see very little of you in the future, for there
is no telling when the war and the consequent
separation of families will cease; and you will
soon be a young man; and I may die any
moment away from home. It is true I hope and
indeed expect to spend many happy days with
you and your mother and your brothers and
sisters, but I cannot help feeling whenever I write
that it may be my last letter.
Above all things, Paul, if you care for my
esteem, and expect to be happy in the future, be
kind to your mother; but this, too, I hope is
useless caution. It will be well, however, for you
to remember that nothing would alienate me from
you so quick as unkindness to her, especially in
my absence.
Write to me often; and be a little careful as to
the style in which your letters are got up - folding,
endorsing and all.
Such things show the
education, or the want of it, of the man; and from
such things the world often forms its opinion.
Doing things well is many times the only means
which the world has of ascertaining whether you
know how to do them. As to your studies, they,
of course, must be mainly of the common
elementary kind: but I am prepared to say that I
think you had better soon begin to fit yourself for

military life. Our nation is to be a military
aristocracy and civilians in the country will
soon be mostly found in the army. We will
soon have a military aristocracy, and civilians
remaining at home will be mere drudges, or
at least be looked on as such. Society at
home will mainly consist of two classes - the
raisers of bread and meat for the army and
the buyers and sellers of the same.
Practice mathematical drawings and get
hold of mathematical science, such as
algebra and geometry, themselves. You can
do all this out of school as well, perhaps, as
in. You may find it hard work at first, but stick
to it, and you will soon come to like it; for the
mind invariably comes to love what it devotes
itself to a long time. Learn to be neat and
exact in your drawings. To this purpose use
the best pencils, paper and inks, and keep all
your implements and materials in good order.
In your studies, never “skip” a problem,
thinking you cannot solve it and that you can
understand it better by and by. This has
been the ruin of many a student. Clear the
way as you go, if it does take time. Leave no
stragglers in your rear, or your onward
progress will be continually hindered by
attempts to bring up these neglected friends.
You would never get on -- But I must close. I
have written nothing as to what is doing here
because I wrote to your mother fully a few
days ago. Things remain about as they were
then. You probably have had all the good
advice I have written you, a hundred times
before. Nevertheless I, for my part, feel the
better for having given it to you. Now then,
go in. Follow the dictates of your own
conscience, obey the precepts of the Bible,
for they contain a morality recognized as
sound by all enlightened men in all ages of
the world, put a proper trust in the Higher
Power and you will not fail.
Your affectionate father, W. Wirt

3

Paul E. Wirt as a young man initially followed
in the footsteps of his father by studying law
under the guidance of Charles G. Barkley, a well
known Bloomsburg attorney, and in 1877 was
admitted to the Columbia County Bar. In the
same year, at the age of twenty-eight, he married
Sara Miretta Funston.
His interest in practicing law soon gave way
to developing a fountain pen. He became one of
the early pioneers to invent a fountain pen. To
make this new writing instrument required a lot of
ingenuity. Basically, a fountain pen has an ink
reservoir, and for it to work successfully the
design had to allow for an even flow of ink when
writing, so the ink would not leak or become
clogged. This new writing instrument, which we
now
take
for
granted
and
consider
commonplace, was a wonderful technological
improvement over the goose quill and the pen
with a metal nib that had to be dipped into an ink
well.
The actual date when Wirt made his first
fountain pen is not known. George Fischler and
Stuart Schneider in their book, Fountain Pens
and Pencils, cited the year 1878 when he
received his first pen patent. However, according
to George Kovalenko, a fountain pen collector
living in Saskatoon, Saskatchewan, there is a
lack of evidence that Wirt received a fountain pen
patent before 1882. Wirt established his factory
for manufacturing fountain pens in 1885. By
1910, the government issued twenty-eight
patents to him as he further perfected his pen –
making him one of the most productive early
inventors of the fountain pen and in perfecting it.
To make a functional and reliable fountain pen
became an endeavor of great competition. The
government registered more than 400 patents to
a number of individuals involved in improving the
fountain pen between 1880 and 1900.
The Bloomsburg Daily on February 1, 1902,
published an article detailing some interesting
facts about his fountain pen business. The
factory located on the southeast corner of Iron

and Eighth Streets was 25 by 75 feet and
consisted of two stories.
Around thirty
employees made nearly 3,000 pens each
week. Cliff Lawrence writing in Pen Fancier’s
Magazine, August 1989, noted that Wirt’s
factory was very efficient and by 1889 had
produced 350,000 pens.
Fischler and
Schneider credited Wirt’s ingenuity in
designing machinery to make pen parts that
allowed him to out produce his many
competitors and to have cost advantage over
them. Wirt pens were sold throughout the
nation with Sear and Roebuck as one of his
major outlets. At the high point of production,
Wirt would employ around than sixty people.
Today, the former factory exits as an
apartment building.
The famous American writer, Mark

An excerpt from Wirt Fountain Pen advertisement in the
1920s, courtesy of Jay Fritz

4

Twain, did magazine endorsements for the Wirt
pens in the late 1800s. A Harper’s Magazine in
1889 carried a Wirt Fountain Pen advertisement
in which Twain proclaimed:
“An absolutely
perfect reservoir pen, a pen compared with which
all other pens are frank failures.” Paul Wirt
retired from his pen manufacturing business in
1922; his son, Karl, then assumed the leadership
role in the company. The company discontinued
doing business in the 1930s.
His other
business
pursuits
included being
a director and
president
of
the
Bloomsburg
Water
Company and
a long tenure
as
vice
president and
director of the
Bloomsburg
Paul E. Wirt, picture taken in
National Bank
1934, Columbia County Historical
Society
(later
called
the Bloomsburg Bank & Columbia Trust
Company, and today known as First Columbia
Bank and Trust Company).
In community affairs he served as a
member of Bloomsburg State Teachers College
Board of Trustees for nearly forty-one years from
May 1891 to January 1935. At the time of his
death, the Board of Trustees adopted a
“memorial” that said in part: “His many years of
earnest and loyal devotion to the best interests of
the Bloomsburg State Normal School and the
Bloomsburg State Teachers College, and by his
jovial and happy personality, he earned and
enjoyed the affectionate regard of his fellow
members of this Board and the esteem of all with
whom he came in contact.” Beginning in the mid-

1890s he became a member of the vestry for
St. Paul’s Episcopal Church for many years.
When the church completed its bell tower in
1891, he provided a set of bells in memory of
the deceased members of his family. Clearly,
his success in business and role in the
community made him one of Bloomsburg’s
more prominent citizens when he died at the
age of eighty-five on January 21, 1935. A
few months before his death the Bloomsburg
Rotary Club honored him for his long and
distinguished career of outstanding service to
the community. Without doubt, the life of
Paul Wirt became a testimony to his father’s
advice.

5

Paul E. Wirt’s home was at the corner of First and Pine
Streets, Bloomsburg, but no longer exists. Today,
Bloomsburg Health Care Center is located at this site.