tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-527285995340947201.post719633147608789460..comments2008-01-04T23:36:18.713-06:00BlackEagleTraderhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13306546640939536407noreply@blogger.comBlogger1125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-527285995340947201.post-60171342943792755652008-01-04T18:34:00.000-06:002008-01-04T18:34:00.000-06:00Calling this a fake (at this point) is jumping the gun. While I am very suspicious of this RWS, I am not convinced that it is a fake. Then again, I am not convinced that it is real either. There is no data to support either claim. Don't get me wrong - I want to know the truth, so I'm keeping an open mind to both sides of the argument. Having said that, I am hiring a private investigator in the Seattle area (where the patch originated) to run a criminal background check on the seller. The seller appears to be foreign, so it may be difficult to find his information... but it is worth a shot.<BR/><BR/>FYI, I bought the first example of this strange RWS back in July and was the first to report it to Patch-L. As you can see from the photo, it is fully embroidered, cloth back, appears to have polyester threads, and is about 10-15% smaller than a standard RWS. Here's what I reported:<BR/><BR/>The seller listed the patch for a $5 minimum bid and did a poor job of describing the patch... which is why I got mine cheap compared to the two recent sales. The RWS was sold separately with about 20 military items that originated out of Europe. It was the only Scout badge. During the auction, I took the time to look up the military insignia and found some of the badges posted on the Heyford base web site. I also confirmed that the Heyford base had an active BSA troop. Most of the sellers patches were from the early to mid 1970's which does align with the introduction of polyester threads. FYI, the glue on the back of the patch that I won showed distinct age discoloring as if it was glued in a scrap book for a period of time - something that would be difficult to manually create. I'm a fairly advanced collector with 25 years of experience and would have a hard time calling this a fake. Yes, the embroidery style is strange. Yes, it does appear to have polyester threads... but we need data to determine how to classify this beast. Until that data arrives, we are only guessing about the authenticity.<BR/><BR/>Frank Kern<BR/>frankkern@oaflap.comquilshanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07344935047638129247noreply@blogger.com