The Mighty Zippo...The Rest Of The Story

About the time I married my last wife, my dad gave me the Continental Can zippo that I had heard, smelled and lived with for my entire childhood.

It was the most awesome gift my father could have given me. This was HIM. This was his life. It was engraved with the logo of the company he had been working for when I was born. This was his approval. This was his acknowledgement that I was a responsible, full grown, adult male. It was his way of saying "Ya done good son, and I'm proud of ya."

I know it's just a fucking cigarette lighter. But it meant a lot to me. It was like he was giving me his life. His legacy.

So one day I make a trip to Independence Center. We're not talking Bannister Mall here, so I'm not as security conscious as I should have been. I leave my dad's lighter, a pack of Marlboro lights with maybe 3 cigarettes in the box sitting in the cup holder of my jeep. I didn't lock the jeep.

I come back out less than an hour later and my smokes and my dad's 50 year old zippo are gone.

My $700.00 Nikon 35mm camera is still in the jeep, but the 3 Marlboro lights in the flip top box next to the convenient silver zippo are history.

This wasn't some sophisticated shopping mall parking lot robbery ring at work.

This was just some broke-ass, lazy fucker with a nicotine fix that needed a smoke and saw an unguarded pack of cigs and a source of ignition.

I was fucking devastated! You have no idea how much that simple Zippo lighter meant to me. I knew I would never see it again.

Flash forward to Christmas, 1994.

My first Christmas as a father.

Galadriel Tanqueray Onassis was only 10 months old.

But in my Christmas stocking was a small, gift-wrapped box.

Inside the box was an engraved, silver, Zippo lighter.

The inscription said:



"My Dad's Zippo.
Love, Galadriel, 1995."


Yeah, I know. She was only 10 month's old.

But it's still a pretty fucking awesome gift, under the circumstances.

I'll cherish that Zippo for the rest of my life (despite the obvious provenance) and I will ensure that Galadriel inherits it when I pass on.

Although I hope she never, ever, uses it to light a cigarette.

And that, my friends, is the rest of the story.

The Mighty Zippo

I grew up around smokers. I was raised by smokers.

I was born in 1955. Everybody smoked. My grandparents smoked. Pregnant women smoked. Doctors smoked. My teachers smoked (the teachers lounge reeked and belched smoke like Cheech and Chongs VW mini-bus). Broadcast news legend Edward R. Murrow chain smoked like a chimney on TV, even as he introduced Public Television on my 7th birthday in 1962.



And the sound track that accompanied all that smoking was the unique sound of the opening, striking, and closing of the Zippo lighter.



It is easy to distinguish between the sound of a Zippo opening and closing and that of a lesser, cheaper lighter. It just doesn't sound the same. (go to the bottom of the page and click on "The sound of a Zippo:" and "The sound of a Rippo:")

Like the "potatopotatopotato" sound of a Harley Davidson...



or the unmistakeble War Bird Growl of a P-51 Mustang firing up it's pistons and taking flight,



it is a uniquely American sound and one that you can immediately recognize, no matter how faint.

I remember my dad's Zippo. It was a company branded lighter. He worked for the Continental Can Company in Coffeyville, Kansas.

His Zippo was engraved with the red-laquered filled logo of the three nested Cs.



Below that was engraved "Continental Can Co. Coffeyville Plant 17".

My dad smoked Camel straights - no filters.


Predictably, that was my first brand as well. I smoked them for years. My pussified frends accused me of smoking them so they couldn't bum from me. Truth was, they just tasted better than filtered cigarettes. But I digress.

I grew up listening to that lighter click open, flint wheel sparking the Ronson lighter-fluid-scented flame to life, and the distictive click of the lid snapping shut to snuff out the fire.

It was ubiquitous.

I quit smoking over two years ago, and that is the only thing I miss. The sound and feel of a Zippo. The ritual of removing it from it's case and unscreweing the spring to change the flint. Refilling the lighter fluid so it's full, but not so full it will leak in your pocket and give you a nasty chemical burn on your thigh.

Ah, good times!

I have another story about my dad's Zippo that I'll save for another time.

But for now, I will just leave you with this AWESOME video of cool Zippo Tricks and a link to this list of tutorial videos so you rebel smokers can learn your own mad Zippo skillz.