General Apathy Posted August 20, 2008 Share #1 Posted August 20, 2008 Hi Forum members, Here is a collection ( strange word to use when viewed, lets call it a group ), here is a group of metal enamelled badges that were virtually destroyed by their gathering. The owner who assembled this group snapped off all the rear fixings, most of them being brooch back fixings, so that he could glue them flat on this board. Whatever historical or even monetary value has been destroyed by so doing this. At best they could be re glued onto a cloth-board background and re-framed, but it is such a pity to see such a waste by this act of vandalism. I can only suppose it might have been done way back shortly post war WWII when these things were given much less consideration. Personally I never seen the three color camp insignia around at shows for sale, maybe I missed them, but it appears that this card was virtually full of them at some stage and they have fallen off or been torn off over the years. Another act of vandalism that I can re-call was during the making of a film about the USAAF, the actors were complaining about being too warm in the scenes showing the 'Blue-Bunny' heated under-suits being worn. So the quick response action from the costume department was to chop off the rest of the suit below the camera angle of chest height . Enough to make a grown man cry. Cheers ( Lewis ) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
General Apathy Posted August 20, 2008 Author Share #2 Posted August 20, 2008 Cont......... here is a close up of the minature badges so badly displayed for this persons ' collection '. Cheers ( Lewis ) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Teamski Posted August 20, 2008 Share #3 Posted August 20, 2008 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Justin Posted August 20, 2008 Share #4 Posted August 20, 2008 That sucks, I brought a lot of patches a few years ago, sadly all the patches were glued into a yellow paper book... there is still paper stuck on the backs of them.. including 3 82ed Airborne and 3 11th Airborne and a hand full of other Airborne patches Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
militariacollector Posted August 21, 2008 Share #5 Posted August 21, 2008 That sucks, I brought a lot of patches a few years ago, sadly all the patches were glued into a yellow paper book... there is still paper stuck on the backs of them.. including 3 82ed Airborne and 3 11th Airborne and a hand full of other Airborne patches It's actually really easy to steam the paper off the backs of patches. I've done it before with a couple of mine with no negative results. You just have to boil up some water, take the patch with some tweezers and slowly peel the paper off the back. Back to the OP, that's really sad that someone would do something like that. I guess they weren't really thinking of the future. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
willysmb44 Posted August 21, 2008 Share #6 Posted August 21, 2008 Think of it this way: How many fo these would even exist at all had they not been glued up like this? A lot of this kind of stuff got thrown away in the 50s and 60s! How many "support the troops" magnets have you seen fading on the backs of cars and have been thrown out? Someday, someone will wish they had some of those, too! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
doyler Posted August 21, 2008 Share #7 Posted August 21, 2008 That sucks, I brought a lot of patches a few years ago, sadly all the patches were glued into a yellow paper book... there is still paper stuck on the backs of them.. including 3 82ed Airborne and 3 11th Airborne and a hand full of other Airborne patches Yes steaming is an alternative and I know you can purchase the small travel steamers for use on clothing.Add water plug in and ...steam.I havent tried them on a patch yet but it may work. RON Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
StevenL Posted August 21, 2008 Share #8 Posted August 21, 2008 Calling it vandalism and saying they have no historical value anymore is going a bit far, but I agree that damaging insignia by removing the pins is a terrible way to present stuff. There are so many better ways to do it! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bill Posted August 21, 2008 Share #9 Posted August 21, 2008 A few years ago I was given over 4000 DIs (1920s - 1970s) by a guy I worked with. He had removed the pins from the backs of about 3000 of them so he could put them in coin holders, then plastic holders, and then binders so he could move them around. He left most of the Beer Cans, a few screw backs and about 1000 clutch backs alone because after 20+ years of collecting he was no longer interested and left them in his garage for 25+ years until I told him I was always looking for military items. He said a bunch of the collectors he was with did the same thing and most, like him were Army officers (Field Artillery). I have traded / sold about half of the ones without pins as they are good fillers until a better one comes along and it helps me get items for my collection. (Follow link for examples) http://www.usmilitariaforum.com/forums/ind...showtopic=24320 Bill Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
101combatvet Posted August 21, 2008 Share #10 Posted August 21, 2008 Uhhhhhhhhh.... not much different from today's collector that doesn't know the difference between cotton and synthetic thread so he takes a flamethrower to all his patches.... duh. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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