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Were Shermans Called "Ronsons"? No, They Weren't


Sturgeon

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Donward, take it away:

 

snapback.pngDonward, on Apr 28 2015 - 22:58, said:

 

Wrong. Ronson. World's Greatest Lighter.

 

Wrong. Ronson. World's Greatest Lighter.

 

Wrong. Ronson. World's Greatest Lighter.

 

Wrong. Ronson. World's Greatest Lighter.

 

Wrong. Ronson. World's Greatest Lighter.

 

Wrong. Ronson. World's Greatest Lighter.

 

Wrong. Ronson. World's Greatest Lighter.

 

Wrong. Ronson. World's Greatest Lighter.

 

Wrong. Ronson. World's Greatest Lighter.

 

Wrong. Ronson. World's Greatest Lighter.

 

Wrong. Ronson. World's Greatest Lighter.

 

Wrong. Ronson. World's Greatest Lighter.

 

Wrong. Ronson. World's Greatest Lighter.

 

Wrong. Ronson. World's Greatest Lighter.

 

Wrong. Ronson. World's Greatest Lighter.

 

Wrong. Ronson. World's Greatest Lighter.

 

Wrong. Ronson. World's Greatest Lighter.

 

Wrong. Ronson. World's Greatest Lighter.

 

Wrong. Ronson. World's Greatest Lighter.

 

Wrong. Ronson. World's Greatest Lighter.

 

Wrong. Ronson. World's Greatest Lighter.

 

Wrong. Ronson. World's Greatest Lighter.

 

Wrong. Ronson. World's Greatest Lighter.

 

Wrong. Ronson. World's Greatest Lighter.

 

Wrong. Ronson. World's Greatest Lighter.

 

Wrong. Ronson. World's Greatest Lighter.

 

Wrong. Ronson. World's Greatest Lighter.

 

Wrong. Ronson. World's Greatest Lighter.

 

Wrong. Ronson. World's Greatest Lighter.

 

Wrong. Ronson. World's Greatest Lighter.

 

Wrong. Ronson. World's Greatest Lighter.

 

Wrong. Ronson. World's Greatest Lighter.

 

Wrong. Ronson. World's Greatest Lighter.

 
 

Wrong. Ronson. World's Greatest Lighter.

 

Wrong. Ronson. World's Greatest Lighter.

 

Wrong. Ronson. World's Greatest Lighter.

 

Wrong. Ronson. World's Greatest Lighter.

 

So I just linked about 40 different period Ronson ads which were published before, during and after World War Two. And I can go on and on and on and link hundreds more if I so choose. ALL of them tout Ronson and their TRADEMARKED slogan "Ronson. World's Greatest Lighter". What is fascinating is that NONE of them feature the phrase "Light's the First Time, Every Time" or any variation thereof except for one that mentions it briefly in the small text. And these aren't po-dunk publications either, with many of them appearing in LIFE Magazine. If Ronson's slogan really was "Light's The First Time, Every Time" then WHY, WHY, WHY are they not publishing that slogan when they are paying for ad spots in the most popular magazines in the country?

 

I'm thinking someone needs to trademark the term Luigi. World's Greatest Liar. Because your insistence on spreading false information in the light of overwhelming evidence to the contrary is getting downright clinical.

 

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I wouldn't be surprised if there was an instance that tankers did call the M4 a "Ronson" but likely among an individual unit or no more than a couple. Maybe a British one since British burn rates were pretty high. But there really isn't anything to indicate than the term was widespread as a nickname for the M4.

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I love it how hes allowed to just come and go, flame, troll, insult, and derail/"incite unrest" at will and yet nothing he writes ever gets moderated.

 

However, if you say even the slightest thing mean back the mods will R/O you in like 2 seconds. (He's like the one person I actually bother reporting.)

 

Certainly shows the moderators don't have their heads completely up their ass and all that.

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It isn't the part that he just disagrees and posts terrible sources. We deal with that all the time. It is that he is a complete bitch about everything which infuriates everyone. 

 

Luigi probably has gotten more comieboos ROed than Wittman killed tanks at Villers Bocage. 

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I'd like to think this gets his 'tarded ass banned, but who am I kidding. The kid has some kind of parasitic hold on the mods there.

 

For someone who's a long and demonstrable history of being a totally worthless individual, he sure does seem to get away with a lot of sheer bullshit.

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And just for the record for this posting, here is the link to the glorious Ronson collector website that has hosted images of so many Ronson (and other lighter) ads.

 

http://www.toledo-bend.com/VCL/index.asp?request=ads4

 

I'm sure we're responsible for the majority of that guys' traffic. It will probably behoove us to upload as many as those images as possible in the eventuality that site ever becomes defunct. Or not.

 

At any rate, I am to the point where I am 95 percent certain "Lights the First Time, Every Time" is not associated with Ronson. Although a stroll through the trademark office would confirm that.

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Annd cheeps is still at it.

 

I reported his dumb ass, here's the body of it-

 

"Can you ban this moron yet?

Read the thread. He's posted trash and been called on it, insulted posters, and generally been a mewling, fetid, meatslapping slackwit the whole time.

Barring that you can issue me another three day RO, because my response to his idiocy will likely earn me another."

 

 

Reaching the point where I may very well, be thoroughly done with that forum.

 

That feckless lickspittle can get away with posting utter nonsense, but god (mod) help you if you get tired of his rampant, windowlicking retardation.

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The funny thing is that I would not be surprised if "Ronson" really was one of the many nicknames that troops used at one point or another for the Sherman.  All I've been trying to argue is that we have no proof that "lights first every time" was an actual slogan.  And since every mention in a book of the Sherman tank includes the explanation that they called it ronson because of "the popular lights first everytime slogan", it makes me think that this must come from a single source somewhere and has gotten repeated again and again.  Unfortunately, Cherps is not capable of having anything approaching an intelligent conversation on the matter.

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Annd cheeps is still at it.

 

I reported his dumb ass, here's the body of it-

 

"Can you ban this moron yet?

Read the thread. He's posted trash and been called on it, insulted posters, and generally been a mewling, fetid, meatslapping slackwit the whole time.

Barring that you can issue me another three day RO, because my response to his idiocy will likely earn me another."

 

 

Reaching the point where I may very well, be thoroughly done with that forum.

 

That feckless lickspittle can get away with posting utter nonsense, but god (mod) help you if you get tired of his rampant, windowlicking retardation.

 

 

I think a lot of us are starting to feel that way about the WOT forums, luckily we have this place. 

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Is this really an argument?

 

Here is the real information.  I have never found a source for a US or British soldier referring to a M4 tank as a monsoon based on anything negative about the tank.

 

A massive search by YT about 12 years ago in response to a HUGE argument on the Combat Mission forum resulted in this information.

 

The term Ronson is first applied to the British PW made flamethrower.  The Canadians took that flame thrower and made it better, and passed to the US Navy which mounted it on M4 Shermans, called the Satan device.  The British did occasionally call the M4 a Ronson, because the flamethrowers in some Shermans were Ronson devices.

 

The flammability of the M4 gas model was a concern that proved a little valid, but it was not until disgruntled US soldiers returned from the war that the term Ronson began to be applied for the tank without a flamethrower.

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After Walt managed to get one of Luigi's abysmal links to work, turns out there was zero reference to "ronson" and the M4.

 

Not that I expect it to shut that idiot up, or make him rethink his stance.

 

He's impervious to logic, reason and an understanding of the argument he is in, the arguments he is making and the arguments others are making.

 

Also guys it's pretty easy to not get vacations. It's actually a fun sport to see exactly how far you can push things.

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On searches, trademarks probably won't be that helpful. This is because the mark is usually a word rather than phrase, and "lights first time, every time" would probably be considered descriptive but not distinctive.

 

I ran a quick search through the USPTO anyway, here are the results:

  • "lights AND first AND time" returns one result (LIGHTS FIRST TIME ... EVERYTIME) for a word mark by the bic pen corporation. The mark was submitted in 1975 and cancelled in 1981.
  • Searching for the owner name "Ronson" returns 314 results, the oldest of which is from 1974 (Ronson corporation, New Jersey).

Given the above, I suspect that the USPTO online database only goes back to the 1970s, so we'd probably have to check paper records.

I'll look into it over my lunch break and get back to you guys later.

 

edit: did a date search. The first available records are from the 1970s.

 

edit 2: I quickly searched WIPO, which has a bunch of records (from multiple countries) going back to the 1800s. Ronson corp applied for a logo in 1929, and had a couple of product-specific image marks (Red devil, an image of a smoking indian and so on) in the 1930s and 40s. Searching for the "lights first time" slogan just returns the Bic mark again, which strongly suggests that that was the origin for the meme. Here is the logo for reference:

 

0zMjRU3.png

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My guess is that Bic used the slogan for their lighters and it got into the public consciousness at just the right moment for aging veterans to confuse it with the Ronson corporation during interviews for tv.

Which is one reason why trademarks are supposed to be distinctive and non-descriprive: a good mark shouldn't allow products to get confused like that.

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Look through the Combat Mission game forums, one of the first big forums for gamers on line, from the late 1990s and you will discover that the US tank suffers from a PR problem originating from model designers in the 1950s and made worse by the American tank hating designers of Squad Leader.  The result was a lot of bad press on the US tanks that was made up.  

 

There are dozens of threads in the Combat Mission forum about how US soldiers derived no benefit from the gyrostabilizer in their tanks and often disconnected them.  The comments will say that crews were not even trained in their use.  All of which is bollocks.

 

The tank gyro was invented by a guy named Clinton Hanna and was installed on every US tank.  It could not be removed without changing the mount, although it could be operated in a neutral mode where it would not affect tank barrel position.  The gyro required no training as it was only on, or off.  If it was on then it kept the current cradle location of the canon no matter how the tank moved on the vertical axis.  The gyro was mentioned numerous times by German staff as a significant quality issue that the faced with German armor.

 

The main advantage that they gave was in quicker first round firing times when a tanks came to a halt, and the ability to fire one or two rounds accurate when they tried to escape.  This advantage meant that US tank guns were nearly twice as accurate in its first shots before and after a move than German.    To counteract that argument you need to get rid of the historical gyro, so you have to make the crews too stupid to use it, or make it, or such good armorers that they disconnect it.  There is on evidence this ever happened in any number of events.

 

At the same time you have to give German tanks every advantage.  German optics were between 1 and 3% sharper at 500meters that US, so you make up a German optics advantage and give German tanks a +10% to hit, or else the MkIV is at a disadvantage to the M4.

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If I come across the image, I'll try and post it.. Basically (IIRC) the stab control box had some trimming pots that could be bumped out of adjustment,  and that a lot of folks would not bother to retrim, (or maybe paint quick align marks) to help get the thing back on track if this occured.

 

I have a relative who was in M4's in the 50's and he never mentioned mechanical issues or fragility with the stab, so take that for what it's worth.

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If I come across the image, I'll try and post it.. Basically (IIRC) the stab control box had some trimming pots that could be bumped out of adjustment,  and that a lot of folks would not bother to retrim, (or maybe paint quick align marks) to help get the thing back on track if this occured.

 

I have a relative who was in M4's in the 50's and he never mentioned mechanical issues or fragility with the stab, so take that for what it's worth.

 

 

I think you are right about the pots.  I fired a M4 at the testing range with other writers a few years back and its Gyro was operational.  According to the owner of the tank the gyro was adjusted in bore sighting the weapon and would be repaired by a company engineer every few months.

 

Many tank gunners from WW2 never mention the stab not because it was disconnected by them, but because it simply was so easy to use no one bothered to consider it any more than they consider a foam eye piece on the sight.  It did have to be turned on and engaged from neutral, but its adjustments were simple and part of bore sighting.

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I recently got a PDF copy of John Buckley's "British Armour in the Normandy Campaign 1944."  It's a really good read and helps to explain the reason the Sherman got a bit of a bad reputation in British service.  And since a good many of the books on the Sherman and Allied armor was written by the British, it's not hard to understand why the Sherman got so much bad press.  In a nut shell, Montgomery was loathe to sacrifice too many infantrymen in the Normandy campaign due to British manpower shortages, so he was willing to use (or misuse) his armor units in breakthrough operations that resulted in high tank losses.  

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