Ralph A

I feel compelled to point out this article is written by a fellow collector and it states merely that "a legal group that examined the law says collectors appear to be safe..." Appear to be? Dispassionately, I asked my lawyers (the Capitol Hill fellows - not the family shysters) about this issue. Their answers were surprising, and might be dismaying... if I was a "U.S." collector. This issue is rapidly becoming even more politically charged than it already is. There are the usual agendas that have nothing to do with stolen valor. Surprise, surprise.

Consider: the bars were originally part of one man's set. Nimmergut's was the worn example; yours was the recipient's "spare." At some time over the years, yours got altered.

Of interest: http://www.cyberussr.com/hcunn/q-jingo.html

That's OK. As a scholar, you are taking it too seriously. I should have posted this to the Lounge! The implication is I'm not a Beatles fan. The twist is I am saying they are presenting their medals to the Stones... Got it now? Obviously I know it is John, Paul et al. "OBE-atles" goodbye.

Read it again, carefully. hooo boy...

Here is a picture of some nice blokes presenting OBE's to Mick Jagger, Bill Wyman, Charlie Watts and Keith Richards:

... now I'll have to dig them out of the storage case and photograph their reverses...

Relevant: http://www.byersnc.com/twoheadedandtwotailedcoins.html

Ack!!! I would leave it alone. The paint job is part of its history, now. I don't think it looks that bad... how do you know the original owner didn't do it? or his kids? (That would be special.) Anyway, if you want to tinker with it, first try soap and water. Might get lucky. Maybe the paint is water-based. ps my favorite EK2 is an old beat up job with plenty of character just like yours. Before you sandblast it, let me know and I'll trade you one of my "mintier" ones for it!

Radio beacon artillery, I'll wager. During the war, the Soviets lifted a complete proximity fuze from Emerson Radio!

...and if these are from French sources, they probably don't include figures for colonial troops... Barbara Tuchman's The Guns of August is a very good read on this subject. "In the chapel of St. Cyr (before it was destroyed during World War II) the memorial tablet to the dead of the Great War bore only a single entry for "The Class of 1914." (Guns of August, Bantam Books, 1980) I went to a military school for a time (The Citadel) so I can understand somewhat better than most the import of these words.

You ain't lyin'. These things used to be $10 each. Now I can't find interesting ones for less than a hundred...

Bitter indeed!

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Listerine drinker eh? Original formula was 54 proof... not unheard of for recovering alcoholics to use it, to ward off seizures.

It was the salted eggs that finally did him in.

That's one big fish.

Yes, it is named, and to a person meaningful to myself on several different levels (not a relative - a casual, much-removed connection). I'll make it the subject of a separate thread, and soon.

Copy of photograph from original.

That's obscene.

Interesting thread... well... parts of it anyway. I have only one. My birth year. Also, my mother's name is Elizabeth. So it "fits."

...

This last one is beautiful. Looks like someone invented a time machine and went back to the jeweler's.... Lovely.

A fake copy... or a copied fake... or a trinket. or maybe Von whatshisface's kids had it made for him, after he lost the original in a crap shoot? I don't believe baroque suspensions were made before 1917, in any event. Seems like i saw a thread on one-sided PlM's... try searching.