Ebay jokes

[ericlida]

I saw that one too. What the heck are those, anyway?

"Either you know what they are or you don't." Love that quote.

They are simple set of pins. They are from old USSR dedicated to all 15 Republicks + the main pin is USSR. You could buy them everywhere many years ago. The price was around 3-5Rub
I wanted to give him an offer $5.00 before I saw the price of S&H :mad:

[willie777]

I wonder how much the listing fees cost...

[order of glory]

Lenin 100th Birthday for Foreigners, I have wanted one of these rare treasures for years. It is in good condition, except for the grinder marks where the words For Labor used to be:laff

[Nota Bene]

This joke is no longer funny, because some collectors actually buy them as originals :mad:

Alexei

[EricFG]

...as a head-scratcher. :confused:

I can't imagine a scenario when this would happen.

[desantnik]

Eric, I could see a foreigner doing this, but the chances of it are slim to none. At least the ribbon is correct.

[Kirchgoens]

I'd have said the star was real, but had a definite homemade mod job done on it to match some other country's uniform regulations (or maybe a veteran who just wanted a complete rack instead of punching holes in his suits). The mint mark, engraving style, etc. seem to match for this range of s/n's. I think it's kind of a cool mod, albeit not kosher for the purists.

[desantnik]

I aesthetically like it too, however, I don't have my s/n database at hand, but what foreign troops were fighting with the Sov's early enough ('41-'42) to have been awarded this and lived through the war?

The s/n is probably too high for the Spanish Civil War too.

[Kirchgoens]

Someone from one of the ethnic groups within Soviet borders who later ended up outside. I believe that starting from as high up as Rokossovkiy, guys with Polish ethnicity or even just Polish names were put in positions of authority in government and military in Poland after the war. Although many, many of the "foreign" communists didn't survive the purges, those that did (after spending many years in the Soviet Union in the 20's and 30's) were often put back in their homelands. I believe many of those served in the RKKA or NKVD prior to that happening. Many of them must have held such awards.

More possibilities: starting in late '41 and into '42, many of the Polish POWs from the '39 Soviet invasion of Poland were either shipped out through Iran to join General Anders' western forces or were inducted into the RKKA (of course this doesn't include the 15,000 or so officers and cadets who were shot in Katyn, Smolensk, and Kalinin/Tver the year before the war started). I believe many of those former POW's ended up serving in the post-war communist Polish government and military.

By EOW data, this was a GPW award from roughly June to November '42, but the front data is sparse as to a more specific location.

And... the other possibility of a Soviet veteran who simply didn't want to drill that hole in his civilian clothing to mount a screwback award, but instead creatively found a way to wear his ORS with the rest of his medals. That's very possible given the variety of unique homemade mountings and ribbon styles out there. Lately I've even encountered a couple BM's in which the owner had handpainted the actual suspension instead of using a ribbon (probably easier or cheaper for him then getting a new ribbon?). The creativity and variation probably knows no bounds.

[EricFG]

I was thinking that the post could've been broken when the damage to the obverse occured and this was a quick and easy way to wear the award.
I know it's just wild speculation...
BTW, I asked for better scans yesterday, nothing's showed up yet. This one's out of Oz*, so ya know.

Has anyone ever seen RS on a suspension? Paul, Brian, you guys must see oddities by the score.


*Australia