I noticed I've been posting a lot of old Maglite history but no lights lately. I'm about half way through my collection so here's a really interesting one with a bit of American history. These are the newer style, Panther light which I normally don't collect but these are so rare and have such a large place in American history I could not pass them up.
September 11th was one of the darkest days for America. It is right up there with Pearl Harbor and the Kennedy assassination. Those that were alive on those days will always remember exactly where they were when they heard the news. I am originally from New Jersey, just 20 miles west of New York City, so 9/11 hit close to home for me. I knew several buddies that were impacted first hand and I also knew some heroic folks who were involved in the search and rescue effort. I think it will remain for some time one of the worst days on record but also stand to a testament of the American spirit.
In true American fashion Mag Instrument donated 3,000 Maglites to the 9/11 search and rescue effort. These were all 3D models and were donated in a variety of colors but as far as I know were all 3Ds. The two below are finished in purple and standard black although the standard black light shown below has no knurling. These no knurling model were produced very sparingly in the early 2000s and are tough to come by today. Mag Instrument has made several giveaway/donation lights and this was the only D cell one that I know of. These were passed out to emergency responders in the days after the 9/11 attacks and as the wording implies were not for sale. I haven't seen many of these so I don't imagine that many were saved during the 9/11 cleanup.
The other official donation and giveaway lights were the George HW Bush 1989 inaugural Mini Maglites, George W Bush 2001 and 2005 Mini Maglites and the 1994 Lillehammer Winter Olympics Mini Maglites. Maglite lists several other donation lights on their website but to the best of my knowledge I don't believe these had any special inscriptions or were any different than the normal production lights.
I was looking for one of these for a while but wasn't sure really what all to look for. Mag Instrument makes mention to them on their site but doesn't show much info. I could see they had a laser etching by the tail cap but until I got this light I wasn't sure if they were all printed that way or if it was just the one on the website. The image from Mag's website is below and shows one finished in a prototype, never released, rose gold finish. I've heard of some of these being distributed for donation as well.
If anyone else has one of these please contact me as there is something on this light that I think is different from other standard 3Ds but I just want to confirm. These are all going to be around a ~29,000,000 serial which puts them right in the 2001 production range. They are not going to be sequential because I believe they are all different finishes.
As always I'm looking to buy Vari-Beams and Vintage/Rare Mags. Please let me know if you have any, top dollar paid.
