Nearly two years ago Don DeYoung took a poll of state strip collectors and identified five Cub strips unknown in any collection: DEL HAWAII MISS SDAK and WYO (one collector said he had seen a WYO Cub but could not identify the owner). Note that Hawaii and Alaska were not states when these strips were used, but full ALASKA state strips exist in both khaki & red and Explorer colors. The two known Alaska Cub strips say ALAS. I am not aware of full HAWAII state strips existing in any colors but red & white, althought there is a TH khaki & red strip (Territory of Hawaii).

We were able to locate a South Dakota Cub strip and get an image of it, but it was not owned by a national state strip collector. Then in March of 2006 a WYO Cub strip was discovered for sale on eBay in a large frame with other Scout and Cub insignia. The entire frame sold for over $500 and the last bidders were after the state strip only. In May of 2006 a South Dakota Cub strip appeared on eBay with a Sturgis town strip, and this lot sold for over $460. The remaing three unknown Cub strips have not been found to my knowledge. A third South Dakota Cub strip was offered on eBay just recently in August and brought a high bid of $405.

 A gauze back PA Explorer strip was sold by TSPA in September of 2007 for over $134. We think gauze back strips of any kind were locally made in small numbers to meet limited demand. It seems strange that there would be a need somewhere for PA Explorer strips, which are not otherwise rare. There is one other PA Explorer gauze back known to me and one IOWA Explorer gauze back known.

State strips are a different animal to collect when you consider that no one yet has completed a set of states in any non-red & white color, unless you accept the TH for Hawaii in khaki & red. There are several unknowns in Explorer (at least DEL and HI), and about half the states are unknown in Sea and Air Scout colors. Several of the known Air Scout strips are unique (one known to exist), including IOWA KY RI VA. The only known Virginia Air Scout strip has a rolled edge, which also is unique.

Part of the fun of state strips is coming across ones previously unknown, but that has gotten harder over the last two decades. EBay has revealed several previously unknown. Two others that have popped up in the last few years that were unkown to me include IOWA Sea Scout (winter) and SC Sea Scout (summer). Some believe they exist in every variety for every state, I am very skeptical.

Bruce Shelley

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That’s the number of different issues collector, and National OA Committee member, Bill Loeble reported to me at the 2007 NCLS. This is issues, not twill varieties or plastic back/cloth back differences.

In the early days of CSP collecting, pre-1980, we paid attention to “twill left rough” (TLR) or “twill right smooth” (TRS) because there were so few different issues. We have pretty much gotten away from this making Bill’s accomplishment even that much more impressive. Generally it is good that we have gotten away from technical varieties that were merely the result of production runs.

We do run the risk though of losing our history of first issue CSPs where twill direction or backing makes a difference between truly the first issue and later runs. Several that come to mind include Longhorn T1 cloth back – the true first issue – much harder than the later runs of this patch or Scenic Trails TLR or…. the list is long. Further, most, but not all, first issue CSPs were on TLR cloth. There isn’t really a good book on these that I’m aware of. The Ellis/Jones/Austin book is the best but even they don’t have all of this documentation. You have to go back to the early issue catalogs from the guys who ran the Illinois Traders’ Association (ITA) who were documenting this as it happened. Most of the web-sites are incomplete as well with respect to this information.

I am working on my CSP entry for my shopping cart. As of 1998 there were 5,450 issues in the catalog. Thus, we’ve basically doubled that number in 8 1/2 years. That works out to 650 issues per year. With 320 councils on average during those years that means 2 issues per council per year. No wonder there are so few national all issue collectors (but there are some!)

I collect all of the Michigan issues where I do admit to collecting varieties of twills, border, backing, etc. I have fun with it. Just going after Michigan gives me challenge keeping up with what’s been issued and special issues.

I had a lot of fun putting together a first issue collection (and why I did research on true first issues.) This area continues to bring collectors in as many of them can easily be obtained but then there are some real bears to track down let alone acquire.

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A red and white air base strip surfaced that I was not familiar with from Morocco. It was the youth military base strip for the person selling it so I asked him if he could share his remembrances from Scouting in Transatlantic Council in the 1950s.

Here’s what he had to say:

Roy,

My dad served in the US Navy in WWII, but he went to Morocco in 1951 as a civilian working for the contractors building the air bases.  In 1953 when the bases were completed, he went to work for the Air Force as a DOD civilian.

My first experience in scouting was as a French cub scout.  We lived in Marrakech at the time, and did not have access to the American scout program at the air base which was about twenty miles away.

I was a French cub scout from 1952 to 1953.  In joined the Boy Scouts of America in 1956 when we moved on-base (Nouasseur AFB).  Prior to that we lived on the local economy as we were not entitled to on-base housing as civilians.  That changed in 1956 due to increasing violence between the French and Moroccans (sounds familiar, doesn’t it).  Shortly thereafter, France, which had governed Morocco as a protectorate since 1912, granted it independance.

Then we moved to another air base where we had on-base housing.  I was a member of Troop 182, Nouasseur AFB, Morocco, from 1956 to 1959.  I think there were five US Boy Scout troops in Morocco, at four Air Force Bases and a Navy Base.  We had a summer camporee each year at Sidi Slimane AFB, which had a large wooded area, unlike the other bases, which were pretty arid and devoid of vegetation.  Scouts from the various troops selected for OA membership were tapped out at the annual camporee at Sidi Slimane AFB and completed their ordeal that night and the following day.  Once tapped out, we were allowed to get one raw egg and two matches, and we were then taken into the woods to spend the night alone.  The next day we had service projects to complete, but were not allowed to talk.  Probably not much different than now…? (Editor’s note – it is still very similar.)

The air bases that I can remember were Ben Geurir AFB, near Marrackech; Nouasseur AFB near Casablanca; Sidi Slimane AFB at Sidi Slimane; and an USAF installation at Rabat, the capital.  There was also a US Navy base at Port Lyautey.  I don’t know if there were troop rockers for the other bases that preceded the TAC red&white CSP for Morocco.

In 1959, our family moved to Ludwigsburg, Germany, where I joined Troop 63.  I earned my Eagle rank there, and I have a Eagle certificate signed by President Dwight D. Eisenhower.  In Germany, we did a lot of joint activities with the German Boy Scouts, especially camping.  The German scouts were really into Indian lore.  They camped in large teepees which could accommodate a patrol size group, and did their cooking in homemade cookware over a fire in the center of the teepee.  We traded patches, knives, and belt buckles with each other.

I worked the summer of 1960 on the staff at Camp Freedom in Dautphe, Germany.  Camp Freedom was operated by the Transatlantic Council, and scouts from all over Europe, Africa, and the Middle East attended camp there for two weeks.  Part of our staff duties were to conduct the OA Brotherhood ceremonies for Ordeal members from all the troops in attendance each two week segment.  We had a lot of fun doing these ceremonies, and a lot of the German neighbors would attend.  Many Germans were big fans of anything to do with Indians.  We had Indians costumes for the ceremonies, and Camp Freedom was a great place for Order of the Arrow activities.  I have some old photographs if you are interested.  I graduated from Stuttgart American HS in 1961 and returned to the States for college, and was inactive in scouting for several years.

I worked as an assistant scoutmaster, scoutmaster, and troop committee member  in Virginia during the 70’s and early 80’s, but I haven’t been active since then, other than contributing to the local council through the United Fund.   One nice memory was receiving a letter in the late 70’s from one of the boys in a troop where I had been an assistant scoutmaster a couple years earlier, thanking me for inspiring him to earn his Eagle rank.  He is a career Secret Service agent now.

Scouting was one of the few activities we had available, especially in Morocco, and it was a major part of my life then.  I most remember sleeping under the desert skies.  With virtually no light pollution and seldom a cloud, the night skies seem to be the most brilliant I remember seeing anywhere.   Before star-gazing, we always had a rousing game of night-time capture the flag.

Ed Morris

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We recently have had several conversations started by different collectors asking where have the ‘odd-color’ state strips gone? First, the frequency of the calls, basically out of the blue, make us realize that this is a more common collecting theme than we realized. As we got into it, there is some real challenge in this area and it isn’t getting any easier.

Some background

From 1952 to 1978 Scout uniforms used either red and white council strips (RWS) to denote location or a similarly colored one-line community strip with a separate small state strip underneath. These are the ones most well known by current collectors because we remember having these as boys. From 1929 to 1952 though the same style of strips existed but they were embroidered on cloth to match the uniform. Thus there were khaki and red strips (KRS) for Boy Scouts. We do even identify a Scout version that matches the pre-WW2 tan khaki uniforms as opposed to the green khaki post-WW2. These are called tan and red strips (TRS) for those who make the distinction.

Blue and yellow strips (BYS) were used for Cub Scouts. Green and brown strips (GBS) for Explorers. There were also strips to match the two types of Sea Scout uniforms – white and blue strips (WBS, the background color is always listed first) and blue and white strips (BWS) which were often felt. The hardest and rarest of all are the blue and blue strips (BBS) for Air Scout uniforms. Just think of the inventory challenge around these? Obviously this had to be the reason for the change to a single style, RWS, in a color that did not match the uniform.

On with current conversations

Well one of the collectors we talked to was pointing out a recent acquisition that he had made. He told us that previously none of the major collections had it and was thus listed as unconfirmed. It was the KY. (Kentucky) strip in Air Scout blue. It had been in Bob Cylkowski’s collection for, I am going to say, two decades at least. It surfaced at auction and this collector won it at $700.

The second call, actually the same day, was a collector who is again trying to put a collection together for all of the states and all of the colors. This collector has been collecting for nearly forty (40) years. He said this is the third time he has worked to collect these and it has gotten significantly harder. He said you used to see these at TORs or you could write folks and find them in their dupes. Not any more.

… and current ruminations

In our office Destry and I got to talking about these different contacts and raised the question – is there any community that has all seven colors? At first we could not think of one. I have a collection from Battle Creek, Michigan that has five of the seven. They certainly could have a white and blue and a blue and blue but I have not seen them.

In checking with collector Bruce Shelley, he said that all colors exist for Baltimore so there is at least one city but he went on to say that he is not aware of anyone who has all seven. Also, there are a couple of New York borroughs that have all seven but not all of the borroughs.

All states exist in red and white and there is a red and white “T.H.” for Territory of Hawaii. There is rumored to be a ‘T.A.’ for Territory of Alaska. There is also a KRS TA but I am not sure if there is a KRS TH.

We believe that all states exist in GBS and BYS but even some of these are still unconfirmed. Recently a WYO BYS surfaced on eBay and went for a significant amount of money. In the KRS, NEV. and S.C. are a couple of the hardest as well as the territories.

Now on to the Sea Scout colors. Actually, these were used later than the others and I think went into the late 1950s and maybe even 1960s. Even so, they do not exist for all states. A major collection might have 8 to 10. An extremely advanced collection might have 15 different. Both colors are considered equally rare although I would say the white ones are slightly harder.

That leaves the Air Scout blues. These are the hardest. Having three different would be a major collection. There may be at most 15 different. These could bring, when they surface, $300 – $1,200 a piece. I have had a MICH. and sold it to a friend thinking I’d replace it and never have. Live and learn.

They are fun. There are new discoveries or ‘re-discoveries’ in this area of collecting. It can be started very easily and in expensively with the red and whites and then advance to the early, ‘odd-colors’, for continued challenge.

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I just fielded an e-mail from a friend asking about the value/price of the shoulder arcs from the 1935 National Jamboree. These were the first “JSPs”, i.e., jamboree shoulder patches.

Each troop had their own arc. The Roman numerals indicated the region. The capital letter indicated the sub-camp. The number indicated the troop. They are made of red felt with white printing. Quite often these can be found unused because the jamboree was canceled but also many have moth holes from their storage over the years. Each participant got two badges.

These used to be a consistent $125 in price. Then they went to $225. Now they seem to be consistently in the $280 – $380 range. They are truly scarce. It used to be that folks collected just one for their jamboree collection. Now there are several that are trying to put region sets together, i.e., one from each region. And, there are a few that are going gonzo trying to get one from every troop! It makes sense though as we collect JSPs from every council for most of the modern jamborees so why wouldn’t some collect the shoulder arcs the same way. If this trend continues, then these could well be underpriced. But also, this is for a very sophisticated and well heeled collector to go after these that completely.

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Blake Keasey, author of the ISCA red and white strip column, is in town today. We got to comparing our air base collections and came up with the following results. Including non-red and white, there are a few khaki and red and blue and blue strips, we confirmed 186 strips. Blake probably has the largest collection with 160 strips. There were about a half dozen strips that are on the list of strips that neither of us could confirm. How they were reported in Art Hyman’s early work, we’re not sure. They may be out there though and that would put it up to 192. We are also still finding un-reported strips so the real total could be over 200. This is easily twice as many as all of the other military base strips.

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Historically Puerto Rico Council’s JSPs have been one of the sought after JSPs at Jamborees. Limited supply and limited number of troops. I was sorting through some of the items I picked up and came across what I think is the 7th JSP from this council. They certainly traded these items as if it were times past when there were few patches but I’m thinking this time was different and that these patches were everywhere. It will be interesting to see the final tally for this council (at least interesting in that I’m not compulsive enough to try and get every issue.) It will certainly be a pain for those who do try to collect them all.

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I’ve been collecting this area for years, sort of as a tie in to my CSPs and then later just as a stand-alone collection. Its a great area in that it is relatively limited, easy to start but has lots of challenge to finish.

For two reasons actually no one has completed the collection.

First, some of these were of extremely limited issue. A full order was a dozen patches. One could order as few as a ‘half-order’ or 6 patches. These orders got placed and were used by Council professionals or council-wide positions only. Others were used only by jamboree troops. One of the toughest was for Orange Empire’s contingent of 12 to the 1971 World Jamboree!

Second, we don’t yet know of what all exists. There are no records. The catalogers (right now lead by Dr. Blake Keasey) are reporting new finds every quarter in the ISCA journal. He and predecessors Art Hyman and Rob Kuts have been at it for years and we’re still making new discoveries. Just last month two new full size RWS were discovered: a ‘GTR CLEVELAND/C’ and ‘ALEXANDER HAMILTON/C’ with small council. That puts the known count of full-size (CSP-size) RWS at around 810 items.

Bruce Raver runs a nice web site that one should check out if you’re interested in this area. It is called RWS World.

This is a very legimate area of the hobby although 2003 this was ‘violated’ with the private issuance of some fake RWS. They are hard to tell but the lettering is off and the white thread, polyester based, has a pink tint to it due to the red base material.

Learn more and enjoy.

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