Origins of cigarette lighter.

[Neil.]

Greetings to you all.
Please forgive me for intruding on your forum as I am neither a Cadillac nor La Salle owner.
I do have a couple of classic cars. 1x Rover P6 V8 and 1x 1965 Plymouth Barracuda.
I live in Australia and also collect antique cigarette lighters. Which brings me to my question to all of you good people.
I recently purchased from the States a German made cigarette lighter from the 1920s-30s. It is engraved with both the Cadillac and La Salle badges from that period.
My question is relating to its origins. Would this have been a promotional item or would it have come with the purchase of a vehicle??
I am hoping you may be able to shed some light on the item as I am curious to find its origins.

Thankyou in anticipation, Neil.

[harvey b]

I cant help you on your lighter,but it is cool as hell,i want one and I don't even smoke Hard to tell how big it is,is it a standard pocket size,or a desk top size?.The 2 scripts do look authentic,but back then they were not as strict about copying this stuff as they are today. Hopefully someone else will remember them from back in the day. Harvey

[gary griffin]

    Neil,     This is an open forum and as long as the posts are related to Cadillac and LaSalle you are welcome to post things especially if they are as interesting as this one.

   It looks very interesting.  It looks very old also.

   I do not know when Cadillac and LaSalle started installing electrical cigar lighters but if it was after 1927 when LaSalle started production, and Cadillac did not produce it I would guess that it was produced by a dealer to go with the new car.  That would explain the German origin as many fine items were produced in Europe, and also they would not be bound by copyright or patent laws.

  If my guess is correct it is very rare, because the dealer would have only ordered the amount of them equal with his expected sales.

  I hope someone else comments  in on this one because it is so interesting.

[Neil.]

Thanks Harvey & Gary,

Harvey the dimensions are 2x1.5 inches, so definitely a pocket lighter.
The age is pretty much spot on with the lighter being from the mid to late '20s or possibly very early '30s.
I look forward to further feedback.

Neil.

[C.R. Patton II]

Hello Neil

Thank you for sharing this item.

I concur with Gary that this is a 1927-1940 Cadillac piece. The LaSalle logo verifies this. I think it was a promotional item manufactured by Zippo. I sent this thread to our CLCMRC Curator, Tim Pawl to authenticate.

[Neil.]

Thankyou for that C.R.
I am not sure about the lighter being a Zippo item. The only marking I can see is the word "Germany" stamped on the bottom. Zippo are based in Bradford, Pennsylvania. The first Zippo wasn't produced until 1933 and I don't think they outsourced their work.

I thank you all for your input so far and am enjoying the hunt for information. The plot thickens!!

Neil.

[Chris Conklin]

Very cool item. I tried to re-size the photo and re-post it, it was pretty large when expanded.