AE Co triplicate

[pfrost]

When I first started collecting I read someplace (maybe it was in Russ Huff's book or maybe the first Silver Wings, Pinks and Greens) that AECo made wings were sought after because they were all made in WWII (since AECo went out of business soon after the war) and so it was easier to age them to the war period then most other wings. It seemed to me that in the l990's when I really started collecting that AECo wings were likely to bring a premium. Ironically, wings like the Bell pattern, was much less sought after. Now the reverse seems to be the case.

 

One of my more advanced wing collecting friends had a nice display of "triplets" showing the command, senior and basic pilot wing of each maker. For years, I have been looking for an AECo command pilot wing, which I believe to be a very rare wing, considering how few command pilots there were in WWII.

 

Here are the command, senior and basic pilot AECo wings.

 

 

[pfrost]

A family of AECo wings from my collection. Somewhere I have the AECo navigator wing but I couldn't immediatly put my hands on it. I am missing a few, like the glider wing, the balloon wings, and the super duper rare airship wing. I also believe that there is a TO wing.

[bobgee]

Great stuff! Thanks.........Bob

[cwnorma]

Patrick,

 

When I was quite young, my first foray into the world of collecting was numismatics. Although I eventually abandoned coin collecting for historical military artifacts, one theme that has stuck with me from those early days is a general preference for "completeness." I've never been able to fully shake that urge.

 

Seeing your wonderful set of AECo wings makes that particular part of my brain, the part that causes me to be a collector, to itch; and makes me glad that I collect WW1 era wings that do not generally come in sets! I am certain that If I were to break down, and branch out into WW2 (I already love seeing them here, on the forum), I know I would be driven to try and complete these kinds of sets...

 

...and its never enough. Is it? First you have to get a set of AECo Basic, Senior and Command Pilot wings, then you need the associated Glider, Liaison and Service wings, then a Technical Observer. Then you find out they may have made a senior Liaison pilot wing...

 

Again, wonderful stuff! Thanks for sharing.

 

Chris

 

 

[mghcal]

That's a great set Patrick! I admire collectors who can wait long enough to put a set like this together. My patience is short and I'm pretty sure I'd go crazy trying to do something similar in a timely(cheap manner so I've avoided it like the plague!

 

While the Command pilot is no doubt a rarity I actually think your Senior Pilot with that hallmark might be rarer. I've never seen one for sale that I can recall, on the contrary I've seen a handful of the command pilots. Very nice set! Another thing I've noticed is that the wings with that particular hallmark usually have the older tophat type clutchbacks.

 

If you've ever noticed the gilt Flight Surgeon wings have that same "older" hallmark. But they are always fairly worn looking with some being so unreadable that they have an incised AE Co hallmark over the top of the older hallmark. If I recall correctly the regulation for the 1st pattern gilt flight surgeon was early 1943. The only other ratings I've seen with that "older" hallmark are the Pilot, Senior Pilot, Command Pilot, and Observer. The later ratings (gunner, air crew, bombardier, letter grades) are seen with the triangle hallmark from what I've found. My theory is that "older" hallmark was used even from the late 1930s on the Pilot and Observer wings. The Observer wings you'll find with that hallmark are much crisper strikes than the gilt Flight Surgeon, my thought has always been to compare the two and see if they simply used that old Observer die for the 1943 Flight Surgeon wings?

[pfrost]

Yes, I have noticed that many new collectors have the same sort of trajectory that I had. First one of each rating, then one of each maker, then a theater-made wing, then a WWI wing... then a pre-WWII wing, then some bullion wing... A wing from an ace, a DFC/AM/PH wing grouping... then eventually, at some point, many of us toy with writing a book. Although, for me, I started becoming a bit more "zen" in my collecting and tried to be more patient and let the wings come to me (mostly).

 

But damn if it is almost never enough. Stupid wing addiction.

 

I am going to try to post a few more command/senior/basic pilot triples in the next few days

[pfrost]

To what Mike was saying. There seems to be a good transition in the AECo hallmarks used on pilot and "alphabet wings". One (and what I think is the earlier version) says A E Co Utica N Y. The later version shows up on pilot, liaison, glider and service pilot wings and has the triangle hallmark. I can't recall if the triangle appears on other wings, but it does show up on other AECo badges. It is my impression that the triangle hallmark dates from not much earlier than 1942.

 

I have the "earlier hallmark" wing but didn't take a picture of it, so I stole an image from a previous post from Russ. The triangle hallmarks are from the pilot, liaison and service pilot wings above.

[pfrost]

The backs of the command pilot, senior pilot, gilt flight surgeon and observer. The observer and gild flight surgeon appear to be on the same base. the quality of AECo wings is, for the lack of a better word... crap.

 

The other hallmarks on the other ratings seem to have been sort of added on by a drunken worker.

[The Rooster]

Wow Patrick! Nice Man!!! Ive got a pair of those AECO aircrew wings. They are marked the same.

I really like that AECO Pilots wing with the older aeco logo without the triangle. Ive been able to pick up two of those.

They are the heaviest wings I have. 29 grams.

The AECO Navigator wing has a sloppy logo you can barely read. The first time I saw one. I thought it must be the one wing. Since then.. every AECO Nav wing I see is just as bad.

But I like the AECO brand for some reason. Still stuck on the snowflake backed wings. Not sure why.. lol

And lately Im fixating on Navy Bullion!

lol . Im new to this but you are correct Sir. Its a very addicting hobby.

Nice group!

[The Rooster]

Never mind my theory about all the AECO Nav wings having botched logos.

I just saw one on Bobs site with a sharp clear logo. Patrick prob has it right. Drunken Logo applier.

[rustywings]

Just to show the wide variety of AECO hallmarks used on the same aerial rating during WWII, check out Patrick's nice gilt AECO Flight Surgeon wing posted above in frame 8 and compare it to these two ...

 

A little something for everyone! Pin-back, clutch-back and three very different AECo hallmarks on three nearly identical gilt Flight Surgeon badges that were only authorized for 19 months (February 1943 to September 1944). I wonder if there are any other AECO hallmark variations out there that were also applied to this rating?

[rustywings]

I've also been an AECO addict for many years... The AECO hallmarked aerial rating that's been the most illusive for me is the silver Flight Surgeon badge...

[pfrost]

Its kind of strange that the gilt AECo flight surgeon wings seem to be more common than the silver version. I have owned a couple of the gilt versions but never one of the silver ones. I wonder why? Its my thought that they are all on the observer wing base, but I'm not 100% sure that is true. Perhaps they used up old observer stock?

 

 

 

 

[katieony]

I have always liked the wings made by AECo.