Gary B

Hi Paul, At work now so can not post any pix. I have seen one pair of Admin Reserve tab (to a Leutnant), unfortuantely not mine! Gary B

Hi, Paul has covered the topic well here. To see some other Reserve tabs please view the database. The reserve tabs are far from common, based on my observations, in terms of rarity, I would rank reserve waffenfarbes as follows (from "easiest" to find to most difficult): Flak, Flight, Signal, Medical, Engineer (Pink), Construction, Admin. Gary B P.S. I have not seen Gary's Construction Reserve tab!!!!!

Paul, What the....? no no no. You are not supposed to be buying officer collar tabs of the combat arms type. YOU are supposed to be buying Admin....now get back on track and send me those butt ugly things so they can get together next to the other foreign made tabs I have! Your former and now envious friend, Gary B

Hi, First off, nice piece Scott. The bannered ducks are one of the rarer ones to find. The bannered ones seem to have been produced by 2 different manufacturers as there are 2 different versions of these. There are many different bannered ducks some of which I do not have (in my collection of about 200 +). Yes, there were cloth versions of the duck. The color of the background cloth matches the color of the uniform so it is pretty easy to determine what branch of service the particular cloth duck was intended for. Some of the different colors include: white, blue, OD, tan, green and even cadet gray. I have only seen 1 bullion version of this insignia which, fortunately, is in my collection. To answer the question of private purchase pieces; yes, there were many versions that one could purchase on the market both cloth and metal (the bannered one pictured is one such example). As far as I am aware the only type the Government issued was the standard button lapel version in gold color. Individuals could buy in 10K gold, sterling silver, bannered with your Service affiliation, pinback, screw back, cluthback, double clutchback etc. There also seems to be a market which grew around the little insignia. There are license plate holders, grave markers, plaques, rings, cuff links, banners, book ends, cigarette lighters etc. Gary B

Dear Micha, Thank you for the informative response. If you can please try to get pictures of the other variants from your weekend meeting. I am sure people would like to see them. If you collect the wound badges like you do the Eks you will soon corner the market on these as well! Gary B

Hi, Just to add my 2 cents....I have been told there are actually 3 Junckers versions; the 2 which Stan discusses (called by some flat chest and barrel chest version) and an aluminum version. A collection of Luft badges recently sold which had the supposed barrel chested version in it. As a side note the spin casts of these are extremely good and have fooled many an advanced collector and dealer. Gary B

Hi, Wonderful badge. I have never seen a piece with the safety catch before. Although I assume your ref to manufacturer is comparing it to an EK producer these safety catches were used by other manufacturers. For TR items the early 800 silver Heer Para badges and silver CBI made USAAC flight badges had this type of catch. So I guess this could be of a different make. Also not sure if KMST was still in business when this piece was made. Gary B

Hi Daniel, Unfortunately, I have to disagree with you ref your statement about the silver Discharge pins. Unlike the WWI discharge pins where silver pins were used to denote that the recipient had been wounded; the WWII discharge pins made in silver did not denote/mean anything. WWII discharge pins were produced in a variety of materials including: silver, 10K gold, plastic (initially blue plastic but this was rejected since it would blend into the blue suits popular at the time), brass etc. Silver pins were just made of a "higher" quality metal. As for silver pins being produced in the early part of the war this is also incorrect. Initial versions of the Duck were enamelled brass (see the 1943 Dec National Geographic issue for an example). These enamelled pins were for service in the Army prior to 1941 which were later modified in design and award criteria to become the Duck as we now know it. The pinback version you picture is actually a discharge pin for women. Women did not have a button hole on their lapels so a pinback version was made for them to pin to their dresses etc. There are Ruptured Ducks that were manufactured to have the mini enamelled ribbon bar lapels pins (the kind found issued in the award cases) attached beneath the ducks. I wil have to check to see if I have one with a PH on it. Gary B

Dear Joel, Yes there were a multitude of manufacturers of the Imperial wound badges, hence minor variations in the design. Also remember that most of these badges were produced after WWI (due to the late institution date) so these badges were made for several decades, 20s, 30s, 40s. Dear Steven, I have a 2 piece badge similar to the one you pictured but mine is a screwback. I agree that this was at one time a screback converted to a pinback. Gary B

Hi, FYI, DRGM is not the Maker Mark but is the abbreviation for the German version of "Patented" design. I have an article somewhere in my fiels on the exact translation which I will try to find. Nice piece! I have a screwback 800 Silver wound badge which has the DRGM markings on the screw device. Gary B

Hi, George Petersen had one of these fighter clasps with the pendant attached to the bottom (the top of the original clasp configuration) to make it a night fighter clasp with pendent. Field expediency! Gary B

Hi Vince, I agree with Gene on this one. I have had the opportunity to handle 3 of these (Signal, Flight, Flak - there is also one for the HG Div) and the detail and workmanship on the real ones is phenomanal. Since you are a tab guy like me I guess the best analogy is to think of a real high quality pair of collar tabs to a cheap set off of ebay. Prices on these are in the low 4 figures...or whatever one is willing to pay. If you need pictures Brian Maederer has 3 on his site including the HG one. Gary B

Dear John, Amazing piece, as are almost all of your pieces! As a fellow Luftwaffe collector, you continue to amaze me with the rarity and condition of your pieces (not to mention your photograhic ability!) Gary B

Firefighter Tabs 3

SHD Tabs, Grade 6-10

Oberst Tabs, Medical

I too only need one more set to complete the entire Engineer set...just the Chief of Engineer tabs. Gary B

Dear Gary, Nice to see you "over here". Nice Admin tabs. Gary B

Firefighter

Hi, It has been awhile since I have posted any tabs so I thought I would start with these recently acquired tabs. Generalmajor equivalent for Engineer Gary B

Wow Joe, you really got a nice score on that group! Plus they are still sewn together...can't beat that! Gary B

Hi Joe, Those are a beautiful and rare set of tabs. Very nice pieces. Like Paul, I, too, am in need ot a set like these! Gary B

Paul, Soooooo, what else is in the works???? Gary B

Hi Paul, Overall I think the tab looks ok. The only thing I do not like about it is the badge cloth material. I have not seen material like this used on a tab before but that in itself should not be a discriminator. I do like the embroidery and the oxydation that is on the gulls. The gulls appear to be matching and I don't think one was added later. Wreath looks fine also. Buckram material is similar to pieces I have in my collection. I only have 3 pairs of officer HG tabs in my collection (Oberst, Leutnant and a Musikmeister) and all 3 are different, in terms of construction, than what most of my other tabs are like. I hesitated buying any of them since they were out of the norm in some aspect compared to my other tabs. 2 of them came from George Peterson's collection which was one of the factors which influenced me to the "buy side". So I guess what I am saying is that based on my experience with the HG tabs many of them seem to fall outside of what we normally see on normal tabs such as Flight, Flak etc. Gary B

Shoulder Boards