Col-USA

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Lighters made in

USA

(Ronson here, Zippo here)

Park a.k.a. Park Sherman, of Springfield, Illinois, USA

c. 1940's?? - unusual very heavy (?? pot metal) lighter from Bor-Lenz

Early model "Jet"

ASR Ascot fluid table lighter

ASR fluid lighter

(?? lighter part of figural dagger)

Berkeley Fluid pocket lighter with aluminium case & steel insert (?? c. 1950's), pic 2 shows insert & cam mechanism & pic 3 the closed fuel cell bottom

Evans 2 x gold plated fluid table lighter

Evans Bone china fluid table lighter

Evans "Black Starr Gorham Sterling Weighted 888" with engraving for Sands Point Golf Club Championship, 1960

Evans c. 1934 fluid pocket lighter

Evans

Enamel & gold plate fluid table lighter

Evans

c. 1950's fluid table lighter

Evans ?? c. 1941 ?? "Spitfire"

Negbaur Brass cannon fluid table lighter, 216mm long

Negbaur The rarer chrome cannon fluid table lighter

Negbaur Knight fluid table lighter, 78mm tall

Negbaur Crest (pat. 1949) chrome fluid table lighter.

The lighter body design was done in 1945 by Herman Treiss who designed many of ASR's table lighters.

59mm tall

Negbaur

c. 1939 Golf clubs fluid table lighter, 127mm tall

Negbaur Bakelight (??) Knight fluid table lighter, 82mm tall

Negbaur

Fluid table lighter, 242mm tall

Negbaur Fluid lighter pencil combo pocket lighter

Negbaur Bulldog

Negbaur Mystic Flame (pat. Dec, 1939), battery & fluid table lighter with wand

Negbaur Cigar

Negbaur c. 1940 "Miss Cutie" table lighter marked Patent Pending

Made in U.S.A. Allbright,

N.Y.

Park WW2 era pocket lighter with steel case & insert & owner attached emblems. Pic 3 shows the simple yet effective cam system. the tube to the left of the flint screw holds spare flints

Park Fluid advertising pocket lighter with aluminium case & insert

Park Fluid advertising table lighter with aluminium case & insert

Phone Lite

fluid table lighter & ashtray set

Giv-a-gift

Jet Line (Brooklyn, N.Y.,) fluid table lighter

c. mid 1960's

Nimrod Pipelighter fluid pocket lighter

c. early 1970's

Nimrod

pipelighter with all it's original packaging & paperwork

Metro fluid pocket lighter from Paragon Products Co., Toledo, Ohio

Golden Wheel miniature liftarm fluid lighter, c. late 1940's

Strike-a-lite hand painted bone china fluid pocket lighter

Tom "Pyro" Prylinski modern trench art lighter - a very knowledgeable (& super lovely) longtime collector. Pic 3 - the lighter & Tom's business card - too funny!

RadioShack/Tandy solar powered lighter, c. late 1940's

Bor-Lenz unusual very heavy

(?? pot metal) fluid lighter with aluminium insert,

c. 1940's??

MEB Diplomat fluid lift arm (c. 1920's)

Nassau fluid pocket lighter

made by

The American Button Co., NJ.

Although the bottom stamp

claims it was patented in 1905

it is more likely to have been produced post 1910

Later model "Jet"

The fascinating "Jet" was designed by Francis Leslie Phillips in 1944

& appears to have been produced until 1961.

It is an improvement on, and an almost exact duplicate of,

William E. Evans 1939 design for the Waterbury Lock & Speciality Co. of Milford, Connecticut.

It appears that Evans' design was based on Guy Barker's (London, England)

invention of the first jet lighter in 1929.

The Jet lighter is a fluid lighter, &,

having a metal tube with a micro-orifice next to the side of the wick,

will produce either a normal Zippo-like flame,

or, if tilted 45 degrees, will produce a long jet flame up to 6 cms long

making it ideal for lighting pipes (pics 3 & 4)

This jet flame was also promoted as being useful for

thawing frozen car locks, blackening gun sights,

lighting fireplaces & campfires, & doing small soldering jobs.

Colby Pocket lighter x 2, 6 cms tall. The early model (left) has the single base screw as against the later version with 2 screws

New Method Quick Action, Bradford, PA. A methanol pocket lighter with a platinum catalyst. Unusual as bottom stamp is over-stamped with “Case made in Japan” (see last pic). New Method used some of the same suppliers as Zippo.

ASR Ascot fluid table lighter

ASR 1949 - 53 Heritage 3 piece fluid table lighter set

- tray, lighter & cigarette holder,

in rhodium finish with bakelite handles.

The automatic 'Light-Switch Action' lighter insert

will stay lit without holding it.

Douglass c. 1926 fluid table lighter, 105 mm tall

Colby Athena table lighter,

67 mm tall

Hollywood Orb, c1940's,

table lighter with automatic

press button mechanism

& windproof chimney

Negbaur c. 1940's early ?? plastic/bakelite/catalin chess pieces

Negbaur Lighter in

fob watch shape,

c. 1940's,

operated by depressing nob causing area to the

left of the 10 to

open & light

Negbaur Eagle alloy pocket lighter with lacquer finish designed in 1941 with patriotic overtones as US was about to enter WW2.

Mayfair fluid lift arm, 37mm tall

ASR 2 Ascot Pagoda fluid table lighters

Douglass Early advert

Douglass 2nd model Silhouette fluid pocket lighter, c. 1928 - the body was thinner than the first model, the Standard. 53 mm tall

Douglass Lighter Company was started by Leon F. Douglass who patented

his semi-automatic lighter with a powerful swing-arm action on October 12,1926.

He was a prolific inventor who was one of the founders of the Victor Talking Machine Company.

Bottom stamps can be found with either Menlo Park, California or the Wrigley Building, Chicago.

He also worked with the Wadsworth Company, who were master jewellers & watch case makers,

to produce a more upmarket line.

Evans Founded c.1918 the Evans Case Company (formerly The Evans Novelty Company), of Attleboro, Massachusetts

started producing lighters by 1928 & stopped in 1960

Capitol - an automatic petrol cigar lighter.

Capitols were likely manufactured in the late 1920's-early 1930's and none date from before 1924.

The unusual brass plated lighter features a mechanical snap up levered mechanism

- this mechanism was first invented in 1923 by Josef Kluss of Vienna.

Kluss was an important Austrian inventor of mechanical lighters but he never patented his inventions in the USA.

Louis Aronson copied the Kluss invention with a 1925 version but never put it into production.

Steele and Johnson of Waterbury also copied the Kluss mechanism with their Capitol model.

They used a 1912 George Eldred patent to avoid possible litigation.

All Capitol lighters are marked with the Eldred patent date - Sept 17 1912 - on the thumb lever.

Steele & Johnson were major producers of brass accessories and they mostly made their Capitol lighter in brass.

It appears that some Capitols had a cigarette ashtray base & some didn't.

(Most of this info comes from Larry Tolkin's study of them)

Colby automatic deco styled fluid lighters invented by Abner Kohlberg of New York in 1944.

The snuffer door snaps open creating a windscreen when the lever is pressed.

The Colby lighter corp was partly owned by singer Bing Crosby & he is featured in many of their 1940's ads.

Negbaur Harry Negbaur of New York designed & manufactured numerous lighters and mens accessories during the 1930's & 1940's

He was a tool and die maker for the Dollin Die Casting Company of Irvington, New Jersey, that cast the figures.

Negbaur appears to have close associations with Hamilton, Demley, Wedemeyer & Zunder

due to the similarities of some of their models.

Irving Florman of New York also designed for Negbaur as well as Lektrolite & some other manufacturers.

He also invented all the New York (American) Dunhill models

and later designed the lighter Franklin Roosevelt gave as gift to Joseph Stalin at the Yalta conference.

ASR American Safety Razor Co. of Brooklyn, New York

Beattie Products, Inc. of New York

Berkeley made by the Flashlight Company of America, Jersey City, N.J.

New Method Helios & Hurricane made by the New Method Company,

Bradford, PA, c1940's.

The first 3 pics are of 2 bakelite cased lighters with the

Rathbun markings inside the lids. The last four pics show a brase cased Hurricane & a hinge comparison with a bakelite case hinge

Pres-a-lite fluid lighter, late 1930's automatic

with a side press mechanism & 10 hole windscreen.

Pres-a-lite was owned by Henry Schiff

who invented the Match King striker lighter in 1933.

Schiff later invented a bakelite 2 motion touchtip model

also called the "Pres-a-lite"

Clark company of North Attleborough, Massachusetts was first established in 1881 and originally made jewellery.

The Clark Firefly liftarm was first invented in 1926 by Edward Foster Clark & was first manufactured in 1928

Clark Firefly fluid liftarm lighter with original lizard skin wrap and 18ct gold plated finish,c. 1928. The gold plate on the front face appears to be stamped "14k shield"

Clark Firefly fluid liftarm lighter with platinum plated finish,c. 1928.

Clark Firefly smoking set (fluid liftarm lighter & cigarette case) with alligator leather

Barlow fluid lighter

Royalighter fluid pocket lighter. Manufactured in the late 1940's by Royal Case Co. of Detroit, Michigan. The bottom of lighter reads pat. pend. but it is likely a patent was never granted.