SS Visors Busting the Roof...

[picone]

[QUOTE=Donald Abenheim]Others have less honorable motives, of course; some treat these things as fetish objects

Kind of like putting SS helmets under a Christmas tree?

Humble Mike

[Martin Stiles]

Maederer has one on his site for this princely sum. He always has nice SS caps, albeit expensive. He also has a nice Waffen SS cap from an Affenrucksack, too, which I would buy if I was so inclined but I have other programming/budgeting priorities at the moment. In 1998, black enlisted caps were 1200 USD, so go figure. These caps are not rare, compared, say, to the grey officer's cap on Maederer's site. It seems that certain of the top end eastern dealers have a cartel, and they raise prices together. They can do so with ease, it seems, because of the global market, as well as the more precise powers of discernment on the part of collectors who are reading what we write for them. I do not have a degree in economics, but the transformation of this kind of thing via the Internet, the Euro and whatnot has been a powerful force overall. I do think that the garden variety Kammerexemplar enlisted cap of the era 1938/9 survived the war in quantity and these are still around, but have been bid up. The early cap with the melton cap cover, added badges of the era 1935/6 and a white tag of the 2d pattern which went in an antique auction for 1700 diverges from this. I personally have a weakness for the earlier caps, that is those before about 1937/8, and these endure in # that I would have not thought possible, either. However, the "textbook" black OR/NCO (as made in the era 1937-1940 or so) cap is not especially rare. There are surely thousands of them in existence, not the small # speculated upon above. Officers caps are somewhat another proposition, and the grey caps are more rare. Sapere aude!

Donald would you be so kind as to direct me to Maederer`s website?
I should be very gratful.
kind regards
Martin

[Adrian Stevenson]

Website address

Hi Martin, I hope Donald will not mind me answering you? Due to the time difference between us and the USA, I can point you in the right direction hopefully now while you are online?

http://www.militarycollectiblesinc.c...tegory_Code=ha

Cheers, Ade.

[Martin Stiles]

Cheers ,Adrian,much oblidged!
Martin

[Martin Stiles]

Maederer has one on his site for this princely sum. He always has nice SS caps, albeit expensive. He also has a nice Waffen SS cap from an Affenrucksack, too, which I would buy if I was so inclined but I have other programming/budgeting priorities at the moment. In 1998, black enlisted caps were 1200 USD, so go figure. These caps are not rare, compared, say, to the grey officer's cap on Maederer's site. It seems that certain of the top end eastern dealers have a cartel, and they raise prices together. They can do so with ease, it seems, because of the global market, as well as the more precise powers of discernment on the part of collectors who are reading what we write for them. I do not have a degree in economics, but the transformation of this kind of thing via the Internet, the Euro and whatnot has been a powerful force overall. I do think that the garden variety Kammerexemplar enlisted cap of the era 1938/9 survived the war in quantity and these are still around, but have been bid up. The early cap with the melton cap cover, added badges of the era 1935/6 and a white tag of the 2d pattern which went in an antique auction for 1700 diverges from this. I personally have a weakness for the earlier caps, that is those before about 1937/8, and these endure in # that I would have not thought possible, either. However, the "textbook" black OR/NCO (as made in the era 1937-1940 or so) cap is not especially rare. There are surely thousands of them in existence, not the small # speculated upon above. Officers caps are somewhat another proposition, and the grey caps are more rare. Sapere aude!

Hello, Again! Having now visited the site mentioned, I would agree the visor
from the back pack looks a good bet, if somewhat overpriced, however as said these things are very rare, and it presents a rare opportunity to obtain
one,this said high prices are no gurantee of authenticity, take a look at the
M43 General issue cap,very expensive, with at best, dubious insignia!
Cheers,
Martin

[Donald Abenheim]

Gruess nach England

Hello, Again! Having now visited the site mentioned, I would agree the visor
from the back pack looks a good bet, if somewhat overpriced, however as said these things are very rare, and it presents a rare opportunity to obtain
one,this said high prices are no gurantee of authenticity, take a look at the
M43 General issue cap,very expensive, with at best, dubious insignia!
Cheers,
Martin

Dear Colleagues, I have bought three excellent SS caps from this dealer, all of which were very, very expensive, but also not to be found easily elsewhere in my limited experience and limited reach. I cannot vouch for all his pieces, only those I know, more or less. Grey SS officers caps are very rare, and the holy grail of collectors; granted the other pieces I have seen from this man, I give this new piece the benefit of the doubt. But maybe it is a frankenstein cap too, like so many others. It does not appear to be, though. One of the glamor dealers asserted to me that Pennsylvania is a treasure trove of virginal militaria, hence the Philadelphia provenance has some credibility with me or not. In any case, it is sort of like British photo recce pictures of Peenemuende trying to determine whether there is a rocket there at a time when such things were very remote and odd. This being said, I have found caps like the Maederer piece for a fraction of the cost, actually, in Austria, but now with the internet and the Euro-teuro, these sources have vanished. Viel Sammlerglueck nach England und an allen Fronten vom Nordkap bis zum Wuestensand!

[Donald Abenheim]

[QUOTE=picone]

Others have less honorable motives, of course; some treat these things as fetish objects

Kind of like putting SS helmets under a Christmas tree?




Humble Mike

I was thinking more along the lines of Eleonore Bauer, aka Schwester Pia, actually.

[billbert]

Not to get off the subject but probably the rarest hat on the militarycollectablesinc website is/was the Postschutz Officers cap he had..

[Johann Anton]

Well, maybe this is the next step in the evolution of SS collectables. Wow, that ought to narrow the field considerably...

[Donald Abenheim]

Images of some remarkable caps

Apropos this exchange, if you wish to see a collection of authentic caps which will some day fetch extraordinary sums, see the world militaria website, where colleague Pepera of the great state of Ohio has illustrated from his extraordinary collection. A very impressive ensemble of black woolens and cap badges! Look and weep! Sapere aude! PS Because I am a techno-banause, I will leave it to one of my gifted colleagues to forge the needed techno-link!

[Johann Anton]

John P's black collection is beyond words, and second to none. Not even mentioning the most amazing collection of gold party shields, probably in the world. Oh yeah, the Dr.'s SS tux aint nothin to sneeze at either....

[Donald Abenheim]

Further evidence

For what little it is worth, a Heinrich Wille, Hannover SS peaked cap, black, OR, on the Bruce Herman website at the modest price of $4,650 dollars. Heran an den Feind!

[jim arrasmith]

For what little it is worth, a Heinrich Wille, Hannover SS peaked cap, black, OR, on the Bruce Herman website at the modest price of $4,650 dollars. Heran an den Feind!

Can some body post the address of the site so we can go look at this SS collection? Thank You

[Donald Abenheim]

Grenadier Militaria Bruce Herman

If you look in Google under the coordinates above, you shall find what you seek. The cap is authentic and of a later date than one often finds. The Wille caps generally came without the RZM/SS acceptance stamp on the reverse of the visor and this cap is likely from 1940, that is, the very last of these made. I also had a chance recently to examine the Sonderanfertigung Wille cap from 1937, which is of very high quality, and it does have the SS/RZM stamp. However, I have seen a half a dozen Wille caps of later make and they all seem devoid of the stamp found in 98.9% of cases with these thingys. Viel Sammlerglueck.