October 12, 201213 yr #76 That makes sense. Thanks man. A coworker here at school just gabe me a jumpsuit with that on the combat side. Fairly modern, no tag in it, but it had lt. colonel insignia, and I think a Vietnam era 1st Aviation patch, as it is a slightly different shade of green, and feels softer than most modern insignia.
October 24, 201213 yr #77 Unrelated question, but in researching my dad's friend that was in the 155th (Stagecoach) Assault Helicopter Company, I found a site with lots of pictures. Everybody is wearing the shoulder insignia with the eagle and the sword. I have no idea what this insignia is. Probably a stupid question, but it'd sure help out, as I would like to have a few. Thought you might like this, This is my Dad's Patch
October 25, 201213 yr #78 whoa man, that's nice... I have three patches, two are probably fakes, one may be real. I'm not a serious Nam patch collector, so I don't mind a few fakes, I sewed one on the spare jungle jacket that I wear sometimes. Going to put a 242nd patch on the other side for my dad's other buddy that was a Chinook man.
October 25, 201213 yr #80 That makes sense. Thanks man. A coworker here at school just gabe me a jumpsuit with that on the combat side. Fairly modern, no tag in it, but it had lt. colonel insignia, and I think a Vietnam era 1st Aviation patch, as it is a slightly different shade of green, and feels softer than most modern insignia. Could be a US subdued twill version.
October 25, 201213 yr #81 whoa man, that's nice... I have three patches, two are probably fakes, one may be real. I'm not a serious Nam patch collector, so I don't mind a few fakes, I sewed one on the spare jungle jacket that I wear sometimes. Going to put a 242nd patch on the other side for my dad's other buddy that was a Chinook man. The one I posted is the real deal for your future reference 1967-68
December 3, 201510 yr #84 Love it! Complete groupings don't come around very often no matter what war or service.
December 4, 201510 yr #86 Excellent collected and documented group! Seeing his cloth CIB over his aviation wings reminds me that there were very few jobs available for younger enlisted infantry guys who were getting near the end of their tour and wanted to get out of the boonies. As a platoon leader in 1969 I recall trying to get some of these guys moved out of 'harms way' for their last few months in-country: the options were driver, cook, sh_t burner, base security guard, and door gunner. Being a door gunner sure wasn't out of 'harms way' but I was able to transfer several soldiers who wanted that job versus continuing to be grunts.
December 5, 201510 yr #88 Vietnam Veterans Database Name: HEILIG JACK C II Branch: ARMY Rate: E05 Rank: SERGEANT MOS: 11B MOS Title: Infantryman Entered: Discharged: Service Number: State: PENNSYLVANIA Race: CAUCASIAN What's of interest apart from a great grouping is the wear of the Enlistedman's Air Crewman Badge, the current and obvious school of thought is that Door Gunners were not permitted to wear them, or at best wear them only temporarily, that it was not a permanent qualification badge. That's the reason for those unauthorized/locally approved Door Gunner wings being used right. But there it is on his CONUS 1st Army fatique shirt, the EM AC wings. This indicates to me what I suspected for a long time, that GIs that served as Door Gunners rated the wings, and that he necessarily did not have to be a school/branch trained helicopter mechanic as is supposed.
April 9, 20215 yr Author #94 The only time it was ever displayed is when I would do public presentations with my traveling museum. Even though I had 2 good size rooms at home I only had room to display parts of my WW2 collection. At the time I had over 1000 Central PA groupings from the Civil War to Vietnam and room was a premium. Another forum member currently owns this.
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