Someone You Should Know: Teen Who Collects Vintage Vacuum Cleaners
BOLINGBROOK, Ill. (CBS) – Jon Durfor is a straight-A student who has found an unusual passion: vacuum cleaners of all kinds.
The 15-year-old from Bolingbrook is someone you should know, CBS 2's Harry Porterfield reports.
The room where Durfor keeps is collection could be mistaken for a garage or a rummage sale. The collection, however, represents the passion of a teenager who became hooked on vacuum cleaners.
Actually, Durfor originally was terrified of these machines when he was a small child.
"I thought it was like a demon coming out trying to eat my face off," he says of his original impression of the machines.
But now vacuum cleaners are his hobby. He has more than 150 of them, and they all work. The teen's father, George, says the hobby has had a therapeutic benefit.
"It went from a fear to an obsession," he says. "I don't think an hour goes by where he doesn't mention vacuums."
The oldest vacuum cleaner in the collection was made in 1907.
Visually impaired and with a learning disorder, the teen is a straight-A sophomore at Naperville Central High School.
"I'm very proud of him," the teen's mother, Lynne Durfor, says. "I'm kinda overwhelmed. We have a lot of vacuums, and I'm running out of room."
The vintage vacuums are for admiring – not vacuuming.
"I do not use any of these because my mom doesn't want me dragging someone else's dirt all over her carpet," Durfor says.
