USAF PJ ribbon rack

[beezman]

Hi all,

I bought a PJ grouping a few years ago, which included a great tiger stripe boonie hat, and these ribbons. I never gave them much thought, but I started to look them up recently, and two of them are quite surprising: the Coast Guard Unit Commendation medal with Operational Device, and the Army Good Conduct Medal.

Is that possible? I know that some Coast Guard pilots served in USAF ARRS units in Vietnam, but I had never heard of USAF personnel in Coast Guard units.

Thanks!

 

1

[kyhistorian01]

The Coast Guard ribbon was probably awarded to your guy for participating in a joint service operation between the Air Force and the Coast Guard, I know another guy who was Air Force and wore such a ribbon, it is also common to see Navy personnel wearing Coast Guard ribbons. As for the Army Good Conduct, it means your guy was probably in the Air Force before 1963. Up until then Air Force enlisted personnel were awarded the Army Good conduct medal as the Air Corp guys had been. The Air Force adopted their own Good Conduct Medal in 1963.

 

Robert

[beezman]

That makes perfect sense! Thanks Robert!

[Bluehawk]

That's a nice rack, indeed. Looks like his service just did span that unique period 1963-1983+ when the AF started issuing a lot of "extra" ribbons (e.g. Training, Overseas Long and Short etc.).

 

Judging from the rack, I'm gonna guess he was in from 1962(3)-1985(6).

[cszakolczai]

can you post pictures of the whole grouping? PJ stuff is really interesting to me.

[seanmc1114]

To narrow down the timeframe a little more, the order of precedence placing the Purple Heart before the Meritorious Service Medal was not changed until 1985. So this bar most likely dates to no earlier than '85.

[beezman]

Thanks for your answer gentlemen.

 

Here is the grouping as I got it:

 

[beezman]

[beezman]

The subdued name tape and patch indicate he was still around in 1980.

The rigger badge is embossed, no hallmark.

The Army jump wings seem to be cut off master wings.

 

He must have had an interesting career to say the least!

[USAFnav]

He had two awards of the Air Force training ribbon, usually that means that he was prior enlisted, then became an officer. Since he doesn't have any other rank displayed, I don't know how he earned two awards of the training ribbon. That ribbon came into use about 1980 or so. Also, he'd be wearing the Armed Forced Expeditionary Medal ribbon upside down -- stripes should be blue-white-red (a very common mistake).

Pete