#12 - 1965 220F - Quality time with the Boy

Vital Stats
Model: 220F
Date: June 1965
Technology: Instant-Lite
Mantles: 2
Fuel: Gasoline
Date Acquired: November 3, 2016


I originally acquired this lantern as an afterthought.  I was talking with another collector who was going to look a collection of military lanterns who was trying to get me to invest in the deal.  The military lanterns were out of my price range, but in the pictures was a run-of-the-mill 220F for $5.  I told him to pick that up for me just for the globe and a couple other parts that I needed.  I met him for lunch, got the lantern home, and immediately start chopping.

The globe went on I forget which lantern, but the 3-piece fuel cap went on Dad's 228F, which had been sporting a brass replacement. I also put the entire globe cage on the 220C, but later swapped it back out as I started to become more sensitive about keeping lanterns original, despite their flaws.  I may have even take off more than that, but from there this lantern got relegated to the shed as a parts repository.

One cool Saturday I was working on lantern and my 4 year old son approached me and said: "Daddy, I want to help you fix a lantern".  Well, what could I do but say yes!  But finding the right lantern would be key, as I'd want one he could tinker with without hurting himself or destroying the lantern.  Also most of the lanterns I had at that time had already been fettled, but this 220F was just sitting in the shed begging for attention, and with no globe to break it was a perfect candidate.

We broke the lantern down and I let my son do as much as he could by himself, but many of the parts were tighter than he could manage so I ended up doing a fair bit. At some point he lost interest and I put it back together to avoid just having a pile of loose 220F parts laying around.  But in doing this I started to notice, hey, this lantern is in really good shape.  My only other 220F was in pretty poor shape and I like to have a nice example of every model, so that plus the new sentimentality I decided to keep it.  Of course then I had to replace all the parts that I had donated out to other lanterns but, being a very common model, did not take long.  So now not only do I have a very nice example of this model, but I also keep it around because I effectively promised it to my son as "his lantern" since he pretty much rebuilt it himself 😉



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