#15 - 2012 285A - Birthday series, part 1

Vital Stats
Model: 285A
Date: May 2012
Technology: Adjustable (Schrader valve)
Mantles: 2
Fuel: Gasoline/ Dual Fuel
Date Acquired: April 13, 2017


One area of interest for most collectors is obtaining their "birthday lantern", either for themselves or friends and family members.  On most Coleman lanterns, starting in 1924, you can find a month and year stamped indicated when the piece was manufactured/assembled. A birthday lantern is lantern who's date stamp match the birth month and year of the collector (or friend/family member/anniversary; whatever date is special).

This can be a frustrating process for some collectors when they find out that Coleman simply did not produce any lanterns on the month of their birth, whether due to labor issues, lineup changes, or supply disruptions, etc. I was fortunate to find mine, a 220H, fairly early in my collecting (I have since upgraded that piece with a better one so I have not yet posted about it), and in fact I have found quite a good number of them (including a 228H that I also kept).  On the downside, apparently more desirable pieces like a 200A or 502 were not made in that month.  The one exception was an uncommon 237A kerosene lantern that had never been used before, but it was out of my price range.

Even more frustrating can be searching for a child's birthday lantern for younger kids.  Most folks who have bought a new lantern in the last few years are not yet ready to part with it.  I, however, was again fortunate when the son of a prominent collector posted on Facebook a large number of 285A's that he had obtained from FEMA, unopened and unused, as surplus from a recent hurricane event.  The majority of these were my son's birthday.  

He has watched me with curiosity (and sometimes frustration) as I tinker with my lanterns, and even wanted to help on this 220F, so he was thrilled when he got one of his own on his birthday!  

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