Mike Beaver and Mark Bando SS insignia book

[Tony & Kaiser]

I'll take the bait. From THIS thread.

Although the narrative is a bit weary for me (I prefer more academic than anecdotal) and there was much room for additional info, I have enjoyed Insignia and Artifacts of the Waffen SS by Michael D. Beaver and Mark A. Bando very much. I noticed a few errors in terminologies, but all books have a few errors, they are a snap shot in time. I believe the author to be sincere and did his best.

The photography alone in colour is well worth the cost of the book.

So I would be very curious regarding the comments below. What items? What page? Exactly what is the issue?

There are a number of items in the Bando book that fall into this category in my opinion. Authentication through publication. I don't have my copy anymore to quote examples but there are a couple or more. Ian.

Just so I am clear on what you are saying here Ian, are you saying that Mark Bando put fake SS items in the Mike Beaver SS insignia book so such items could get authentication as original ? Personally, I have been impressed with that book on SS insignia and find this accusation both alarming and surprising, Chris

Hi Chris, not Mark, but there are a few fakes in there including one or two things which other specialists were unhappy about. Let's not derail the cover thread though Cheers, Ian.

[ironcross13]

I own this book would like to see what is bad

[90th Light]

Thank you for starting this thread Tony,

The comments on the other thread have got me puzzled. I repeat that I have a lot of respect for this book and have not regretted buying it.

If there is any controversy then I hope the items in question will be listed here. We can then see/ learn what the collecting community of WAF thinks of them.

It has been my experience that advanced collectors/ authors of the caliber of Mark Bando and the late Mike Beaver would include such items for good reasons. May be even a veteran connection or an unknown variation from the norm,

Chris

[Gary Wood]

I cannot comment on the book as I have never seen it

[David T]

It is a great book and more a Bando book than a Beaver book. I have it packed up right now so can't quote page numbers but there a few bad pieces. Very few maybe less than 6. If I can recall I remember seeing a bad panzer beret insignia set, a bad sleeve eagle on camo cutoff. Also a questionable embroidered "bevo" tk.

[SJP]

Why not ask Mark himself to comment? ...I would be surprised if he hasn't had any feedback.He is quite approachable (IMHO)
Cheers Steve

[Felix]

I still have not got any copy, but I will. I know a friend whos got the book. Would be interesting to browse and see.

Cheers
//Felix

[Mr.Jerry D]

I really like the book. It has been a while since a book got me excited as a kid with the Sears Christmas wishbook catalog. The photos are great. I didn't see anything that jumped out as suspicious to me, I would like to know what pieces seem suspicious. This is one of the few that surpassed the "bible" of the cloth insignia of the SS...

With Bando's stuff he got most right from the vets and recorded the information. He gets points from me just for doing that. I can't tell you in my youth how many WW2 vets I didn't even think to ask where they got something, it seemed like they would be around forever...

[jayjay198666]

It really is a great book, I would love to own some of the items in it, A lot of stuff is from the John Farroco collection.

[David T]

Mr Jerry, I agree. I really appeciate that Bando records and documents the history and provenance of the pieces he gets from the vets. So many pieces (probably most) in collections have had their history lost to time. Greatfully much of the book is Bandos pieces with the stories and often histories of the pieces included.
Much of the book is also the material I would expect came from Beavers estate. I believe M Beaver compiled photos from many other collectors of insignia for the intention of the original project. This is where a few pieces slipped through.
I did dig my copy out so I could flip through. Over the past couple years with books packed away I had forgotten just how much info was in this book.
Pg. 155 bottom. Not a sleeve eagle I would like. Its a repro as far as i am concerned.
Pg. 130 bottom. Panzer beret insignia. Again not for me, repro as far I am concerned.
Pg. 129 bottom center. I am pretty sure this piece is listed on this forum in the fakes and repo pinned thread. Repro or original variant....I have no clue. That piece may have originally come from Beavers collection. good or bad...you decide.

Anyway, overall the book is the book on Waffen SS insignia. I would highly recommend it to anyone or everyone interested in the subject.

[Mr.Jerry D]

Thanks David,
I will take a look.

[rbno]

Beaver / Bando

Let me begin by saying IMHO this is the best book on cloth insignia worn by the mainstream formations of the WSS. Also, any book on Third Reich collectables without errors was written by someone playing it too safe and not interested in advancing the knowledge of the hobby. I applaud Mark (and Mike) for producing such a book as this.

Having said that, I am positive one item in the book is a reproduction. Here's the story...

About 10 years or so before the book was published, I sent Mike Beaver a stack of about a hundred 35mm photographs of various items in my SS cloth collection for possible inclusion in his book. I didn't hear anything for years and frankly, I forgot about it. After his untimely death, the stack of photographs was returned to me in the mail. There was no note, and it took me a while to even realize what they were.

When the book was published, I went through it from cover to cover to see if any of my photographs happened to be in it. There was only one, and it is attributed to me. Much to my horror, it is the Technical Officer sleeve diamond on page 165. It is a Pakistani repro, complete with the dots of death. At the time I submitted it, I did not realize it was bad.

I told Mark about it at the next SOS so it could be corrected if the book is ever revised.

So, there is the story.

Having fessed up to my part in the story, I would like to propose some discussion on a few other items in the book. Hopefully most of them will turn out to be originals that I am not familiar with, and I will learn something.

1. The skull button on page 123

2. The machine embroidered skull on page 129, bottom center

3. The panzer beret skull and possibly eagle at the bottom of page 130

4. The printed tropical sleeve eagle at the bottom of page 155

I suspect 2, 3 and 4 are the ones David T referred to.

Alen Davidson

[rbno]

OOPS! Looks like David T posted while I was writing and having dinner.

[David T]

Alen, thanks for the additional info! I would have had no idea about the tech. Off. raute. The TK button on pg. 123 ..... I forgot about that one...thats bad. Those tk buttons have made it into books for so long. I seem to remember there is one in the little Jack Pia book put out almost 50 years ago.

[M Bando]

re: errata in w-SS Insignia book

First, I want to thank all of you who bought this book and I appreciate the positive comments. Mike Beaver collected most of the photos before his passing, but I'm responsible for the writing and selection of which insignia were depicted in the final product.
There are tabs and sleeve eagles on pages 122 & 146, which I knew would be subject to questions, but I 'presented them' as abnormal and /or disputed examples. There were 2 reasons why I included them at all. First, most of these were among the over 1,000 photos which Mike Beaver collected before his death and they were handed over to me by Bill Shea, after Mike's passing. So there was no chance to discuss them with him, and I assumed that Mike considered them to be either original, or at least worthy of inclusion, -with qualifications-.
Secondly, those items came from the collections of some very reputable collectors like Dave Delich and Bill Shea. Some of the LAH officer cyphers and 1 nco cypher have drilled holes in them, but some of those came from Ray Embree who says he got them from veterans, so the jury is still out on that subject. This detail might well be debated until the end of time.
The pz beret insignia at the bottom of page 138 and the printed camo sleeve eagle
on page 155 have Dealer-not Veteran-provenance, and so they are subject to debate. But they are interesting, which is why I showed them. Despite the negative opinions of some, there is no positive evidence to prove they are fake. Ditto for the drilled LAH cyphers.
The owner of the sleeve diamond bottom right on page 165 did indeed contact me about the actual origins of that patch, but not until the book was in print. Both the right reverse patches on page 119 are supposed to be different from each other, but the 2 images are the same. This was a screw-up by either my layout girl or the printer, (I never figured out who was responsible), but it was not me. The reverse of the top tab was buckram, but although I placed it on that page with In-Design, when I did the initial layout, the reverse of the same (bottom) tab got printed twice on that page.
There seems to be some general agreement that the cap button on page 123 is a repro and that is my mistake, because that item came from my collection. I've been told that the cuffband on page 246 with nearly impossible to read script, is mis-captioned, but I can't find my correction notes at this time.
Finally, let me state that when Mr Shea handed this project to me, I put all my laundry list of other planned WW2 books on the back burner and moved this project to the top of the pile. He gave me about 5 thick binders, filled with photos that Mike B. had collected for the book before his passing. They were not real well organized by units and subjects, and there was a tremendous amount of material to be sorted and organized into chapters. I did most of this in an 8 month period and If I'd consulted a panel of experts on every piece included in the book, I'd still be working on it, with an expected publishing date of around 2025!
So my apologies for the imperfections- and I also took a lot of heat for not including foreign volunteer units, but I thought that subject deserved a separate volume. After the last 200 copies of the original printing are sold, I'll try to sell this book to a mass market publisher, and will incorporate the corrections at that time. However, due to the massive size of the book and expense of publishing books with color illustrations, I suspect that the mass market version will be greatly reduced in size, with probably entire chapters deleted, to make the book more affordable for both the publisher and the customers.
Anyhow, thanks for all the corrections and if there are more, please let me know and I'll try to get those details straight in a possible future edition of the book.

I went to Afghanistan as an embedded journalist with the US Army in 2008 and 2010 and have been working almost a decade now, on a book about that subject. I'm hoping it will be in print by Christmas of this year. This also sort of overlapped the SS Insignia book, but the Beaver project moved up to first priority until I could get it in print. I've been retired from my day job since 1999, but have not been idle.