Grey SS Cap for SS Gentleman in Asia

[stonemint]

The sweat band in the field grey cap at the head of this file is similar to this piece I include here, a black Sonderanfertigung cap of late make.

Such caps were wrongly maligned by some as fakes, but they are quite real.

I believe A1 27 is Weissbach of Glachau in Saxony or Schlesien as stated above by one and all. In any case, a province with an "S" in it. Mr. Stonemint was extolling their virtues.

What this similarity in sweat bands means is too arcane for me.

We deal with the fragments of the past as best we can.

Maybe the order and sequence we detect reflect merely our own mental fragility and limitations in the face of the unknown unknowns.

Happy collecting.

F-B, I was one of those who were skeptical of these #27 Weissbach visors, but having examined one in person, and can positively state that they are period caps, and are some of the better A-SS RZM NCO visors by any maker.

I agree with you about the art of haberdashery being a lost one--I, too, lament mass production and the use of shortcuts (ie, glue, polyester, and plastic), all of which are used for current-made visors of all countries.

IMHO, even some of the "best" fakers (the ones who create the Frankensteins), can only imitate, but never duplicate, the work of a Master cap-maker (or even a journeyman, for that matter). In my eyes, they will always be an apprentice, and they just can't pick up the "art" of making caps without extensive Guild experience.

I often take "flak" for focusing on minty examples and not field-worn salty pieces. This is because I extol the virtues of the capmaker who made it, and the person who wore it is secondary to me, and a "salty" cap diminshes the art of the hat. I'm biased, but imho, no country/city-state ever made a more aesthetically pleasing example of headgear than the Germany of 1933-45 , either before or since.

Anyway, time to get off my soapbox--just my 2 cents for the nite.

[Friedrich-Berthold]

F-B, I was one of those who were skeptical of these #27 Weissbach visors, but having examined one in person, and can positively state that they are period caps, and are some of the better A-SS RZM NCO visors by any maker.

I agree with you about the art of haberdashery being a lost one--I, too, lament mass production and the use of shortcuts (ie, glue, polyester, and plastic), all of which are used for current-made visors of all countries.

IMHO, even some of the "best" fakers (the ones who create the Frankensteins), can only imitate, but never duplicate, the work of a Master cap-maker (or even a journeyman, for that matter). In my eyes, they will always be an apprentice, and they just can't pick up the "art" of making caps without extensive Guild experience.

I often take "flak" for focusing on minty examples and not field-worn salty pieces. This is because I extol the virtues of the capmaker who made it, and the person who wore it is secondary to me, and a "salty" cap diminshes the art of the hat. I'm biased, but imho, no country/city-state ever made a more aesthetically pleasing example of headgear than the Germany of 1933-45 , either before or since.

Anyway, time to get off my soapbox--just my 2 cents for the nite.

Gentle Colleague, I did not mean to direct my comment to you, but to others. Delich in his article on caps in 1969 makes indirect reference to such caps, and a well known dealer in so. California in the 1960s also reminded me as a child that these black caps also had a grey liner, as in the case of this Weissbach piece. They are indeed well made, superior to the product of Clemens Wagner in the later variety, in fact. Wille also made this Sonderanfertigung cap, actually.

One can even today become an apprentice cap or hat maker on the old pattern in Germany---there are advertisements in the internet---but surely those who made military and political caps are surely all dead or nearly dead, and with them has vanished what colleague Mr. Stonemint talks about. In fact, my Mercedes now has little of the poetry of my 1979 240D, which was surely among the best built cars I have ever owned.
Rationalization, standardization, cost cutting, and a production line world of Taylorism and scientific management have meant the death of many remarkable feats of crafts and arts.

I only ask that the regalia I seek be authentic, but to each his own. As one who has spent a lot of time with men and women who lived through the III. Reich, I am quite interested in the wearer and his (sometimes her...) biography.

Thanks for your comments.

Having spent a large chunk of time in Europe in the span of forty years, as well as having bought hats to wear there, too....odd as it might seem....then the shape of this change is quite vivid to me.

[Bob Hritz]

An interesting sweatband on a black NCO hat by maker 28.

Bob Hritz

[Friedrich-Berthold]

Notice this same dark brown here....the left piece, Kornacker, Magdeburg, in a cap from 1934/5; the right, a Wagner from about 1938/9...these later Wagner caps have a maroon-brown band not unlike that of the Weissbach ones. Sorry for the lousy image of the cap on the left....the photographer used his cell phone in the heat of the moment.

[Friedrich-Berthold]

Another cap, what I think is a Wagner, too. The missing sweat shield is typical of these caps. One should not automatically construe same as a sign of larceny. This aspect is one reason why I suggested above that these things got more cheaply made as the SS expanded, materials in the apparel industry were rationalized for wartime after 1936, and the emphasis was made on cutting costs, because of deflationary efforts in the heating up war economy prior to 1939.

[Friedrich-Berthold]

another example in a much earlier make of cap.... but, dear cap fans, please note that no where do I use the phrase "textbook" to characterize this color band. I think these scraps of leather or ersatz textile could just as easily be milk chocolate colored, or even tan, depending on imponderables that elude any real answer, i.e. in the tanning techniques of the respective cap band maker. I know that the composition of the black woolen textiles themselves was delineated fairly clearly in contract items (see the Beaver books....), but I imagine that this dark color band was one of several varieties and not necessarily the object of some minutely worded directive from the VASS so that any deviation from same should make a collector reject what is surely a variation.

Happy headwear....

[Friedrich-Berthold]

the dark brown band once more in an another early cap....by the way, this cap---like many early SS caps--has the red rubber sponge behind the sweat band....there is not high tech piece of cloth sewn to the leather to provide a cushion. The cap in post 44 of similar construction actually has a lining of this same orange-brown silk. Happy collecting. This last image comes from a fine colleague in Texas, who is proud owner of this remarkable piece.

[ace]

wow they are all amazing looking caps

[Friedrich-Berthold]

wow they are all amazing looking caps

...and not for the faint hearted, either, as concerns determining what is authentic and what is not. Save the images for your files and look at them from time to time. I have endeavored here to share forty three years of experience, to say nothing of the collective experience of my colleagues for the profit of all....and to do so without the lord of the flies countenance that obtains elsewhere.

Happy head wear....

[vady]

>the lord of the flies countenance<

yea F-B - you've kept yer wits about ye' - no simple thing when so much money's at play these years, and a mere whiff of critique turns some into ungentle creatures.

"KILL the pig, SLIT her throat, BASH 'er in!"

- lord of the flies