Reviews

While I am only learning about this subject. It gave me an excellent understanding of what I need to know.

Great book . very informative.. Good section on repair and identifiying.

Along with a brief history of American lanterns, Mr. Hobson offers information on the anatomy of lanterns including how they work, identification of parts, materials, finishes and markings. Seventeen different US manufactures and their lanterns are identified and illustrated with detailed specifications. Excellent advice for collectors in locating, identifying and pricing, as well as, repair, restoration and care of lanterns. From a well respected member of lamp and lantern researchers.

This was the first book I bought on this subject, and I found it invaluable as an introduction to early lantern manufacturers and lighting technology. The author clearly explains the different fuels available at different historical periods, and the technologies that utilized them. Contains many very clear reproductions from early catalogs organized by manufacturers in an easy to read reference format. Using the entries here, it is easy to locate the manufacturer, model, relative date of manufacture, and background on most commonly-encountered lanterns. The rarity guide is somewhat lacking in timeliness and should be updated, however. Despite that, I also recommend this author's Book Two as a useful addition and supplement to this book. Advanced collectors would likely be disappointed, but novices and experienced collectors will find this book interesting and informative.

Reviews

This is a wonderful book for the beginning collector. It's the first book I bought after being bitten by the lantern collecting bug. I bought the earlier edition of this book in the 90,s. I thought this edition would be more updated than it is. It's almost the same book! The only thing that is different is the price guide and maybe a couple of pictures. If you bought the earlier edition, don't bother with this one. If you are new to collecting lanterns or don't have the earlier edition then don't hesitate to get this book. Maybe I should have given this more stars but I really thought after all these years there would have been a bigger difference in the content.

A definitive work on the subject of American made lanterns. A wonderful documentation of the history, contribution and technological progress of lanterns in the United States. An engaging photographic investigation of companies, people, places, uses and prices of kerosene lanterns from 1830 to the present. Contains a wonderful restoration chapter with great hints. It is safe to say that it is a complete treatment.

Of all my books on lantern collecting, this is the one that I would recommend most highly for the beginning or advanced collector alike. It covers a number of lanterns from different manufacturers with great pictures and thorough, accurate descriptions. It also gives the history of the different major manufacturers, restoration tips, and a priceguide. While it does not cover every lantern made, it does not pretend to. It instead educates the reader, so that he/she may age (by construction methods and lantern chacteristics), and determine value of the lantern without the need of reference. In my opinion, you can not go wrong with this book. Mine is dog earred from being read so many times. This is a "must have" for the lantern collector.

Author Dennis Pearson has written a wonderful book that not only gives the history of the kerosene (and precursor fuels) lantern, but is filled with some 200 photographs and illustrations of lanterns past and present. The color photographs are simply superb. These are not snapshots of lanterns, they are studio-lit celebrations of the lantern of the quality you would expect to see in a magazine ad. Pearson's work concentrates on the barn lantern, but the major types and manufacturers of railroad lanterns, as well as other types, are also presented with the author himself pointing out that a number of books have already been written concentrating on the railroad lantern. If you're looking for the details that will help you date a lantern they are here, but you may have to do some page flipping, as a single model of lantern may have been made over such a long time that it spans the author's dividing lines: all solder construction, machine and solder construction, and all machine construction. There are chapters on how to date a lantern, the operation of lanterns, and restoring old lanterns. Finally, Pearson gives a "lantern value calculator" that enables you to calculate the rough value of any lantern, and a price guide to some 130 lanterns, including the more common railroad types and some foreign lanterns. Unlike some other books of this type, Pearson's prices seem to match pretty closely with the real world. I highly recommend this book to anyone interested in kerosene lanterns.

Reviews

Full disclosure: I usually put out a newsletter and do all the card buying, addressing, signing, envelope licking, et cetera, for our Christmas cards ever year, and after spending hours doing all that last year, I decided enough was enough and to go with Christmas postcards in 2010. With that in mind, I bought this book intending to detach the reprint Christmas postcards to send out in December. I like the Victorian theme, which seems pretty unique these days, and am looking forward to NOT tasting envelope glue. As a book, this is a nice one for the corner of your coffee table, although you're limited to November and December unless you're okay with having Christmas-themed stuff on display in April or August. The cards are a very nice cross-section of reprints of actual Christmas postcards from 1890-1930. If you're thinking of sending out replica Christmas postcards this winter, I'd highly recommend this book. Dover puts out a couple of similar books as well, but although they're usually a little cheaper to buy, the paper stock is thinner, you get only 24 cards as opposed to the 30 this book has, and you'll be dealing with perforated edges once you pull them out of the Dover book. Spend a little more and get this one.

We use these post cards at our church to decorate our tree...They are so beautiful hanging on the tree.

"The period between 1880 and the First World War was the great era of the picture postcard. Inexpensive postal rates and high-quality, high-speed printing methods encouraged the growth of this craze, which swept the world and brought countless thousands of postcards into existence. Christmas was naturally a popular postcard subject, and here we reproduce thirty very different and interesting antique postcards from our large collection."--Laughing Elephant