In prior posts, I’ve talked about collecting lettered shoulder insignia (LSI formerly known as collecting RWS – red and white strips). See here, here, and here. With our handling of the Bill Loeble collection we are offering the best military base strip (MBS) collection ever assembled. MBS are a specialized area of LSI. They look like community strips in most cases but actually reflect locations where the US, and the BSA, had presence around the world.

I view this as a highly legitimate, albeit tough, collecting area of our hobby. Most items were made in very limited quantities. Even to this day we are still discovering unknown issues even though they were in general last made in 1972 so folks have had 50 years or more to identify them

I recorded an informational video as it is easier to show issues and aspects of this area of collecting.

Collecting the world of these, and not sure anyone has ever completed this as I think Bill got the furthest, is a heck of a challenge but that’s what makes it fun. Some ways to start though might be:

• Collect the bases in your state
• Collect the bases in your region
• Collect a single service branch
• Collect just outside of the USA
• Collect the red and white issues
• Collect the odd colors that pre-date the red and whites (i.e., pre-1953).

They make a wonderful display. They’ve not been faked although there are some modern re-issues as council shoulder patches just don’t do justice for units at these locations. Have fun!

P.S. Some have asked where the ratings come from. We’re using the ones published by ISCA, the Interenational Scout Collectors Association. Here’s a link to their web-site and the guide. It is free to download for members.

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