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Evolution or Plagiarism?


5thwingmarty
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5thwingmarty

Some time ago Russ was able to identify Robbins as the maker of a certain style of 2" wing. The hallmarked wing he happened to find was a Pilot wing. I have non-hallmarked wings in this pattern for Pilot, Aerial Gunner and Aircrew. These wings are all made from unique dies, all have small raised Sterling marks on the left side of the wings and are all pin-back wings. They are all also 2" wide.

 

Here are the fronts of these three wings.

 

post-96854-0-71445000-1586448325_thumb.jpg

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5thwingmarty

I later found a Flight Engineer wing with the same wing details, and the back appeared very similar to that of the Robbins Aircrew wing. The center section of the FE wing has a slightly bigger diameter, the Sterling mark is incised and on the right side of the wing and the wing is a clutch-back with short nail-head posts. This wing is slightly less that 2" wide. I assumed the FE wing was still from Robbins, just possibly a late or post WWII production piece.

 

Then I found a Flight Nurse wing that appeared to have been made from the same base wing as the FE wing, but it was a pin-back wing with the Sterling mark incised in the center. The FN wing has now been joined by a Bombardier wing and an Aerial Gunner wing, both of which are clearly made from the same base wing, but are both clutch-back with short nail-head posts and incised Sterling marks with the marks in the center on the AG and on the left side for the Bombardier.

 

Here are the fronts of these four wings.

post-96854-0-16905000-1586448406_thumb.jpg

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5thwingmarty

I was still assuming these were late or post war products from Robbins, until I saw another FE wing currently on ebay. It looks just like mine, only it also bears the 11W mark for Western Military Supply. Here are pics from this wing on ebay.

 

So did Western Military Supply acquire the dies from Robbins, or did they just copy the style of the Robbins wings? The similarity of the rear striking patterns leans me towards them acquiring the dies.

 

 

 

 

 

post-96854-0-56529200-1586448604_thumb.jpg

post-96854-0-06242200-1586448612_thumb.jpg

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Since these wings were never hallmarked in the first place, it is very possible that Western simply bought unused stock from Robbins, stamped their maker code into the wing and supplied them to the Air Force.

 

All nice wings and a very interesting observation. Thanks for sharing with us!

 

Allan

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5thwingmarty

I think Russ or someone else shared a photo of a Senior or Command Pilot wing in the Robbins style in another thread. If anyone has any more variations in this pattern please feel free to add them. I have another Aircrew wing in this general pattern that I didn't show as it looks like a much more recent version that doesn't fit with either set, almost looking like a chrome-plated gift shop piece.

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