Conn Smythe's ww1 medal for sale!

[Avitas]

I saw a brief story on the sports channel about hockey legend Conn Smythe's engraved ww1 Victory medal was for sale and the Canadian government is trying to make it stay in Canada. This medal is truly a piece of Canadian history and I for one don't know why the Canadian government doesn't just buy it for the national museum! Conn Smythe was a legendary early Toronto Maple Leaf hockey star of the 1920's and the award for MVP of the Stanley Cup Playoffs is named after him. I dare not estimate what this will bring in on the free market and I was wondering if anyone else had heard this and had more info on it (maybe a bidder??!?).

Cheers,

Pat

[deptfordboy]

Hi Pat,

I read about this - I think there is some contention as to whether this medal is the 'real deal' or to another man.

http://www.thestar.com/article/194694

Cheers

Gilbert

[peter monahan]

The info. I've read also points out the discrepancy in the naming and said that there was a "2nd LT C. Smythe" in the Indian Labour Corps. So... ? A replacement ? The fact that the family has all SIX of his medals is signifiicant too.

A possibly dodgy singleton from a group of 6 is hardly the sort of stuff to invoke the Cultural Properties Act over, IMHO.

As interesting in this all is the role of Mr. Dave Thomas who is a (self-appointed) saviour of Cdn militaria from the clutches of anyone who wants to buy it. A tricky issue and I applaud the idea, but he seems to work by calling all the papers then asking others to pony up the money to "save" these from eBay. So the publicity drives up the price and when the medals are 'rescued' some museum in Canada is then asked to buy them, possibly outside their collecting mandate and certainly without prior reference to their budget. I have a feeling that Mr Thomas will "cry wolf' too often and then some real treasures will go offshore.