Wk 02*** Light (ers) of Christian Royalty

T. W. Christian, Jr., known as Pop Pop by his grandchildren, passed away when I was ten years old. He was my favorite of four grandparents, and I am sure he was the favorite of my thirteen cousins, five sisters and two brothers. Pop Pop’s children, who are my mother, my two aunts and my uncle, also loved him very much. He was very popular in his generation as well, and many important people came to pay their respects at the funeral home. In the weeks and months that followed his death, my parents, aunts and uncles would meet at Pop Pop's house to settle his estate.

One day we had a family reunion of sorts, with all of my aunts and uncles and all of my cousins and siblings meeting at Pop Pop's house for the purpose of dividing up his stuff. Pop Pop’s four children had already claimed the larger items of the estate; now twenty-one grandchildren where given an opportunity to select smaller keepsake items, things that would keep our memory of Pop Pop fresh for years to come. Sixty three such items, or groups of items, were arranged throughout the house for viewing and for selection bidding. Starting with the oldest child from each of the four families, selections were made until each grandchild had one item, then the process was repeated until all items were chosen. It was a fair distribution of the full collection of all the memories of Pop Pop.

During the preview of the items, I saw what I wanted, and it was the only thing I wanted: a dozen cigarette lighters and a few fountain pens neatly stored in a cardboard cigar box. Most of the lighters were in the original boxes and had never been used. However, one lighter was special enough to save with the rest even though it was completely worn out and broken. This one was a tarnished silver Zippo pocket lighter with the name T. W. Christian, Jr. inscribed across the front to look like an autograph. The lighters and pens had been given to my grandfather by corporate executives who desired to do business with the Baltimore Gas and Electric Company. Pop Pop had worked for BG&E for fifty years, and had retired as head of their purchasing department.

I was the tenth child in line to select a keepsake from Pop Pop’s estate, with four boys and five girls making selections ahead of me. I had little hope of the lighters being passed up by my older male cousins and even less hope of my parents allowing me to select a treasure that seemed more suitable for an adult. Plus, at age ten, I had already been punished a number of times for playing with matches, and my parents were surely concerned I was becoming a pyromaniac. Never the less, the treasure of cigarette lighters became my inheritance. I think the cigar box was small in comparison to the other items available and my cousins went for the larger items first. There was no lighter fluid to make the lighters work, so I couldn’t start any fires. But most important, I think it was obvious that this keepsake was best kept new in the box, the value of these collectable items already evident.

Thirty years later I moved to the country and discovered yard sales, flea markets and estate auctions. I became a collector of collectables. First and foremost, I became a collector of cigarette lighters. In the last twelve years, I have added over seven hundred lighters to my original twelve, with the majority bringing new memories of the era when Pop Pop was most famous. Now part of American history, the names and logos of major corporations grace the fronts of my cigarette lighters. The value of my collection is somewhere in the neighborhood of 15 to 20 thousand dollars. The memory of T. W. Christian, Jr. has not passed away with an old broken cigarette lighter, but instead his memory has grown to shed rich new light on the Corporate America of yesterday and the royal era of my grandfather and his cigarette lighters.