Back in the day, Jack Mercer was a Triumph motorcycle dealer rep, his area included the Penton Brothers shop in Amherst, Ohio as well as the local Triumph dealer in my area, Fran Kupec Cycle Sales in Butler, PA. Mercer used to hang out at Penton's shop as detailed on page 56 of the John Penton book. Mercer saw the first Pentons at the Penton Brothers shop when they arrived, and apparently he was impressed with them, he recommended to Kupec that he add the Penton line to his dealership, which he promptly did.
Tony John, an avid racer who was the service manager at Kupec's shop, promptly took the dealership's first Penton home to try it out. That evening my mentor, Bob Augustine, stopped by the house and took me along with him to see this new machine, that was the first time I ever saw a Penton.
Tony John no longer lives in the area, but he and I keep in touch by email. The other night I mentioned to him that I would be really curious to know the serial number on that Penton, he instantly emailed back that it was serial # V-200, and somewhere he had the original factory tag that came on the handlebars, I was quite surprised by all of this. Yesterday Tony sent an email and had a picture of that tag included in it. The serial number was indeed V-200 and the engine serial number was # 5389184.
I have checked our list of serial numbers and V-200 isn't included, if you ever come across this machine I sure would be curious to know where it is. In the mean time, Tony is sending me that factory tag, wouldn't it be neat to once again have that tag attached to the Penton that it came on almost 40 years ago.
Thanks
Paul
(http://img519.imageshack.us/img519/424/pentontagmf6.jpg)