Keeping us safe from Purple Heart collectors..

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AZ Jeff
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Keeping us safe from Purple Heart collectors..

Post by AZ Jeff » Mon Oct 31, 2016 11:00 am

I read an except of the recent John Adams Graf article in Military Trader regarding a legislative proposal to significantly ban the possession, sale, and transfer of Purple Hearts. Think Stolen Valor and its consequences on the US medal collecting community and you'll have a taste for this bill. I've got to think that there isn't one militaria collector in an elected position judging by the blanket legislation they offer with no concept of how it will make legitimate collectors and historians "criminals" over night. Frankly, I don't care what it aims to "protect". If it has the net affect, intentional or otherwise, of criminalizing the collecting of harmless, historical artifacts by law-abiding citizens IT'S WRONG. We can't pass meaningful legislation on things that matter but we can sure put some feel-good cr@p on the books.

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Re: Keeping us safe from Purple Heart collectors..

Post by Mark Tombleson » Mon Oct 31, 2016 2:56 pm

I see both sides of the argument....

https://veteranscollection.org/tag/bann ... rt-medals/

Here is one from 2012 with a tearjerker post in the comments section:

http://usnews.nbcnews.com/_news/2012/09 ... s-and-foes

I can see some 95 year old vet being unable to produce documentation and being arrested for wearing a medal the gov. say was unearned.

I am sure glad father was buried with all his stuff... but his barracks cover, which I have.

My opinion is less government is better government.
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Re: Keeping us safe from Purple Heart collectors..

Post by AZ Jeff » Tue Nov 01, 2016 11:39 am

Good synopsis in the first article in my opinion, thanks Mark.

"Repatriation" is certainly a noble thing -- if one has the resources and the ability. As noted in the articles, research on WW2 KIA medals is usually possible since they were routinely government engraved. Conversely, if the medal is not engraved -- and the vast majority are not -- its attribution over time will be a story, regardless of whether it comes with paperwork. Ideally a PH collector encounters the "trilogy" (my term) -- cased, named medal, citation and "death accolade" (with facsimile presidential signature). The George Marshall condolence card and original NOK shipping box are a bonus, and a rarity. Among collectors these complete groupings bring the highest value and, guess what, there's a strong possibility they won't be destroyed or discarded accordingly -- at least not in their lifetime. The "excessive" value that anti-collectors chide over is based on basic economic principles of supply and demand. These medals -- particularly the "trilogy sets" -- rarely come up and for the obvious reason: FAMILIES KEEP THEM. I'm all for families passing this stuff on to their own and hopefully not just the PH. But if the medals -- and other items -- do end up, legitimately, in collecting circles we should be happy that there are those in our society that cherish this stuff and spend money to preserve it.

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Lee Bishop
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Re: Keeping us safe from Purple Heart collectors..

Post by Lee Bishop » Wed Dec 07, 2016 10:48 am

I don't collect medals because I just don't 'get' it. But I don't begrudge anyone who does and I just also don't get those who demonize those who collect them.
This quote from the article link said it best:
“They’re not there because somebody pried them out of the hands of an unwilling person,” said Kraska, a military souvenir collector since age 15. He’s now 45. “They’re there because these families have thrown them away or sold them. So these pieces become separated from the family not by accident. They are discarded items.”
What's better, a collector's case or at the bottom of a landfill?
Many of us here have had people give us something from a vet in the family, looking for a 'good home' for it when the family doesn't care but doesn't want to throw it away. Sometimes, they wanna make a buck on that item.
This is a slippery slope, what's next? Will the day come when they say we can't own Jeeps because people drove them in WW2 and we're not worthy to own them now? Where do you draw the line?
And for that matter, what the heck would happen to all the medals once they're outlawed? Every museum in the US would soon have a packing crate filled with whatever medals get outlawed, and you know most (if any) would never get displayed...
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Re: Keeping us safe from Purple Heart collectors..

Post by AZ Jeff » Wed Dec 14, 2016 10:16 am

The militaria-collecting generations in the US are passing on -- and it was, largely, a postwar/generational phenomenon fueled by disposable income. As the longtime collectors pass away, or otherwise attempt to liquidate their collections, the market will either be filled with this stuff or the landfills will. All of this comes as younger generations care more about their free music and iphone than history, and disposable income shrivels. My dad (76, collecting since 1950) and I (collecting since 1977) talk about this regularly these days. We should be encouraging the interest in, and collecting of, Purple Hearts, not passing laws that restrict access to them.

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Re: Keeping us safe from Purple Heart collectors..

Post by Lee Bishop » Mon Dec 19, 2016 2:42 pm

Jeff,
I sell-buy at plenty of military and collector shows. There's a lot of young people in the hobby, make no mistake of that!
This is not a hobby that's going to vanish when the people who remember WW2 stuff in surplus stores for cheap prices are gone.
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Re: Keeping us safe from Purple Heart collectors..

Post by Radtech » Thu Jan 12, 2017 8:24 am

Under Title 18 USC 704 it is already a crime to buy or sell US military issued medals authorized by congress.In the old days to get around this law we always sent a cancelled postage stamp so you bought the stamp and the medal was free.

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Re: Keeping us safe from Purple Heart collectors..

Post by AZ Jeff » Thu Jan 12, 2017 9:55 am

93 years has passed since 18 USC 704 was enacted and during that time the proliferation of militaria collecting, representing 60+ of those years by my estimate, hasn't resulted in the widespread application of the law to rid our streets of such undesirables? Maybe this was our government's attempt to keep petty criminals out of our prison system or perhaps there's been an understanding by our government that such collector activity did not meet the "spirit" of the law's original focus (whatever that may have been)? Or maybe its another case of "selective enforcement"? I remember the "stamp thing" as well. Regardless, why pass a law targeting the Purple Heart if it already qualifies under 18 USC 704?

There are plenty of other legal hammers still on the books including 18 USC 711(a) ..."Whoever, except as authorized under rules and regulations issued by the Secretary, knowingly and for profit manufactures, reproduces, or uses the character “Woodsy Owl”, the name “Woodsy Owl”, or the associated slogan, “Give a Hoot, Don’t Pollute” shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than six months, or both."

I suppose it's time to scrape the bootleg Woodsy emblem off my Toyota and get back to collecting Nazi Iron Crosses and Soviet Orders of the Red Star.

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Re: Keeping us safe from Purple Heart collectors..

Post by Lee Bishop » Thu Jan 12, 2017 10:36 am

AZ Jeff wrote:I suppose it's time to scrape the bootleg Woodsy emblem off my Toyota and get back to collecting Nazi Iron Crosses and Soviet Orders of the Red Star.
I fully expect that within my lifetime (assuming I live past retirement age), there'll either be a law criminalizing Swastika-marked stuff for private ownership or at the very least, suggested by a PC-addled lawmaker.
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Re: Keeping us safe from Purple Heart collectors..

Post by AZ Jeff » Thu Jan 12, 2017 11:25 am

Perhaps Lee. What better way to relegate historically significant events to the proverbial trash pile than by making the tangible evidence disappear from sight? That's the same whether it's a swastika bearing EK2 or a Washington adorned Purple Heart. Out of sight, out of mind.

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Re: Keeping us safe from Purple Heart collectors..

Post by Radtech » Thu Jan 12, 2017 12:22 pm

The swastika will never be banned in the USA sense it is also a Native American symbol.And as with other minority groups here the Native Americans will prevail.

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Re: Keeping us safe from Purple Heart collectors..

Post by Lee Bishop » Fri Jan 13, 2017 8:04 am

AZ Jeff wrote:Perhaps Lee. What better way to relegate historically significant events to the proverbial trash pile than by making the tangible evidence disappear from sight? That's the same whether it's a swastika bearing EK2 or a Washington adorned Purple Heart. Out of sight, out of mind.
Exactly. That very thing is happening right now in regard to the Civil War...
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Re: Keeping us safe from Purple Heart collectors..

Post by lt.luke » Thu Apr 27, 2017 1:55 pm

Lee Bishop wrote:
AZ Jeff wrote:Perhaps Lee. What better way to relegate historically significant events to the proverbial trash pile than by making the tangible evidence disappear from sight? That's the same whether it's a swastika bearing EK2 or a Washington adorned Purple Heart. Out of sight, out of mind.
Exactly. That very thing is happening right now in regard to the Civil War...
only one side though....

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Re: Keeping us safe from Purple Heart collectors..

Post by Jon » Thu Apr 27, 2017 2:55 pm

Hope they don't do the same here or in Great Britain....
This from 2009.

The "ultimate" gallantry medal –
The only double Victoria Cross from the Great War – has been bought by Tory peer Lord Ashcroft for a world record price of nearly £1.5 million.
Nov 21, 2009

That's about $2.Mil US dollars
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Re: Keeping us safe from Purple Heart collectors..

Post by AZ Jeff » Fri Apr 28, 2017 6:04 am

Well, we don't want some millionaire trying to pass himself off as a Great War double VC winner do we? :D

I recently sold a PH ID'd to a WWI nurse during a show in Phoenix. Research showed she'd died in 1942 and was one of a handful of nurses wounded during the shelling of a Verdun field hospital on 11/02/18. The collector buyer said he thought the name sounded familiar... The next day he brings in the New York State Conspicuous Service Medal named to the same gal. He'd bought it on line years earlier. So, after decades apart, these two pieces come together again.

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