Xmas HLs

Would you like to see HL discontinue "blinking" Xmas lights and return to the "solid piece" type of construction?

Great idea, Rock! Hopefully, many members will take the opportunity to cast their vote. Good way to let HL know what we are thinking.

Do not care for the "blinking" Christmas lighthouses! (nor any other "blinking" lighthouse).

The "blinkers" are turned off in our home!

No lights for me and while we're at it I would like to go back to the original 17 concept concerning the looks and detailing. Too many flags, wheel barrows, hoes, rakes, etc. The pieces are getting to look too much like CSC pieces to me and you all know where her company went.

Perhaps Harbout Lights should offer us a choice. A lighted or unlighted version of each new issue.

Probably won't ever happen because of the expense and uncertainty about which version will sell. Even if you preferred a lighted(or unlighted) and your dealer ordered the oposite of what you wanted then the unwanted one would probably sit on the shelf until clearance time. Sometimes too many choices are not a good idea and we collectors tend to be fickle.

The CSC details were tacky; HL's little items add a more natural look to the scenery.

I happen to like CSC lights and have collected most of them, but only pieces that she made herself in her Maine studio, very similar to HLs Canadian-made lights...she packed a lot of detail into a small figurine that is easy to display and clean.

I just hope Kim Andrews sees this poll...I like to think HL still listens to their collectors. Batteries and adapters are turning this once classic line of collectibles into cheesy disposable giftware...

While Googling for "Cheryl Spencer Collins", I found a mysterious link to a discussion in which some familiar names seem to confess, that, Yes, I've been tempted in the past...

Read the confessions

Including some guy named "Rock" who only had 196 posts at the time.

I read the "confessions" and recalled how I developed an interest in lighthouses. I grew up near the Port Isabel area. In those days we had to cross to Padre Island by boat. Someone in the family had worked at the Point Isabel Lighthouse but no one recalled in what capacity. I saw the light only a few times, but I got hooked. So, when I received the Lighthouse Depot catalog many years later, I had to order Point Isabel and Bolivar Point. (They were the GLOW's but I didn't know better; I have since acquired the LE's.) No one does them better than HL; however, I do have a couple of Leftons and a couple of Spoontiques of those lights which have a special significance for me.

In June 1994, Amy figured to surprise me and bought a CSC Ponce Inlet lighthouse from our local Hallmark store. Having been stationed right across the inlet from Ponce and also having worked on the electronics in the lighthouse it was a special piece to me. I marveled at the intricate detail and she loved the "little creatures" on the base. I was as happy as a pig in mud until the following week we were in Middleburg FL at a gift store and I saw the HL version of Ponce. It was twice as big and more detailed and it didn't have the "little creatures" on it. It was also 50% of the CSC piece. I bought it instead and returned the CSC piece. The rest is history on my collecting HLs. Oh, by the way, I was in the local Hallmark store about 3 years ago and they were going out of business and what do you think they still had? The same Ponce Inlet(same serial number) that Amy had bought eight years earlier and it was 75% off. I bought it and 3 other CSC pieces for display purposes at work and now have them packed away with the rest of the junk I brought home when I retired. I'll keep the Ponce piece but will eventually sell the other 3 CSC pieces as I have no room to display them.

Rock, I hope you are planning to forward the results of the poll to HL. HL seems to take the forum members pretty seriously.

Rich, you have great tales to tell. I am envious of all of you who were actually able to work at some of the lights while in the CG.

Actually, Grace, this was my plan...get it out into the open and hope that someone from HL still frequents this site to gauge collector opinion.

Please, Please, Please .... discontinue those blinking lights!

I don't particularly care for the lights on X-MAS, LE, GLOWS or any other HL item. I don't ever use them or turn them on (only check to see if they work when I first get them).

And I "HATE" those darn jacks in the side of the lighted pieces as well as the stupid little feet. They always seem to be in the wrong location. The sculpture of the piece looks great and then some "blind" person puts the jack in the most annoying spot possible.

My opinion is that they look CHEESY (cheap).

Let the original style of LE return !!

Since it is nearing Christmas and I don't like these lighted pieces, especially on hte Christmas pieces, does that make me a SCROOGE? :p

Not at all!! There would be a lot of Scrooges, if that were the case!

I like the blink on the Christmas lights which goes with the whole christmas settings. They can lose it on the rest of the lights.

Merry Christmas

Chuck