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New Junk Box Jump Wings

a2jacketpatches

Active Member
Second Parachute Wing find in a week. These are even better being English made by FIRMIN / LONDON and three battle stars. They've seen better days, a crying shame the pin and catch are gone but these a the real deal most likely representing D-Day and so on.

 

unclegrumpy

Well-Known Member
Wow! You better keep hitting that honey hole!!!

Those jump wings are super....leave them alone, they are IMO perfect as is. The problem is, if you mess with them, then they will become indistinguishable from all the humped up ones out there....which the vast majority are. Yours are real, and rare to find where you know they are good.
 

a2jacketpatches

Active Member
I agree, I like the salty stuff. In the same bin were a bunch of single ETO ribbons with bronze stars. How easy is it to drill some holes and stick the stars in. Sterling wings in a container with a crushed Hard boiled eggs gives a great even patina in a week. Learned that many years ag when I showed some wings at an antique store to a girlfriend that I wanted, she got them for Christmas but polished them shinier than a new penny. I'd bet most of the Jump wings with stars I researched today were just that, newly put together and artificially tarnished.
 

unclegrumpy

Well-Known Member
Yes, I bet most are newly created. It can be really hard to tell, because this is something people have been enhancing for 30 or 40 years...long enough to get legitimate age on them.

You should do well on eBay with those....they guys that know, will know these are good ones.
 

unclegrumpy

Well-Known Member
Yes, I agree it would be better if the pin and catch were there, but they aren't.

One thing to factor in, is it is not that uncommon to see these wings with the pin and catch removed. That is because the dapper look was to sew the wings to the ovals, rather than pin them on. There are also theatre made jump wings that have four little tiny rings for stitching to the ovals...these don't have pins on the backs at all.

It is hard to tell exactly why these wings lost their pin and catch, but it does look like the pin was snipped rather than broken. They also look like they have had some recent cleaning, so that limits the ability to stretch the detective work much further.

That said, I don't think it is too far fetched to believe the vet might have done the removal in 1945, and that possibility is another reason to leave them as they are.
 
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