Deschler and its secrets.

[Friedrich-Berthold]

I have also enclosed in my 10,000 posts a lot of things, but I have not translated every word. I have explained what is in a document.
There are surely old line collectors with knowledge who refrain from all of this, as are there also old line collectors who are too stupid to explain anything, or they are anal retentive and withhold knowledge.
I am griped much more with willful spreading of disinformation, or bad information that is poorly analyzed.
The cyber bullying to intimidate new collectors with misinformation is by far worse than any other thing that transpires here and I have seen a lot of this over the last thirteen or so years.
But I understand Ben's frustration. Were he to come to my collection, I could explain more in person.
But my question concerns the date, cause and effect of items that determine rarity or nor as these are based in historical fact, and not accident.
I guess I failed to make this point, which is to my mind one of the flaws of this means of exchange.

[BenVK]

"I honestly feel that most of the older generation have let us all down."
You seem to have forgotten Mollo, Schneider, Beaver, Hugh Page Taylor, Schlicht, David Littlejohn, Hicks, and a host of others who provided reams of reference material.
"The problem is that the source material just isn't there anymore to buy and in any case, you guys never offered it to us even when you had it and had it for years."
The source material that all of the above and myself have relied on is, and has always been, readily available from archives. The extent of just one of these sources was illustrated earlier in the thread by FB. Personal collector holdings of original documentation are minimal compared to the raft of material available through government sources.
You'll forgive me if I take exception to your remarks but they strike me as rather counter productive.
d'Alquen

I'm sorry you took exception, I truly am because it wasn't my intention at all.
I've never read Mollo, Schneider, Beaver, or any of these authors and never will.
My education is based on my own research and opinions so ironically, I have been learning through the very source material that you've suggested that we all familiar ourselves with.

[Friedrich-Berthold]

We old persons started with Mollo, which remains the corner stone of any sophisticated grasp of this material. He more or less single handed invented the field and he did so with basic research in the sources as they existed in the 1960s. His books are dated to the contemporary mind, but I still read them each month, along with a lot of other things.

[Friedrich-Berthold]

I read this, too, when I was a pup, the Organisationsbuch d. NSDAP.

[Friedrich-Berthold]

I have not bought the Ulrich of England book, as of yet, though.
Mollo explained in as much clarity as possible the link between organization and uniform. No such thing existed prior to that moment.
The hundreds of SS websites simply recycle what Mollo and Bender did in the late 1960s, and the Beaver books contain color pictures of a select group of uniforms and caps and such that have become the center of gravity. Mr. d'Alquen has appended thousands of pages of documents which are a revolution and of great merit.
Young collectors regard these websites as a magic lantern of knowledge, which they are, in my mind, to only a limited degree.
The degree to which a lot of the same old information and less knowledge is recycled is quite troublesome.

[BenVK]

It's a difficult subject to talk about without treading on toes and I really don't mean to offend anyone.
It's just that we are all strong minded people, we have to be so to be successful collectors of SS regalia, regardless of age.
My point was just that we have all submitted such hard earned information in the last 2, 5, 10 years and right here on this forum.
I don't read Mollo and the like, it's dated and clunky information IMO with no organic development or improvement.
That is why the web wins everytime because I get to disuss this in real time with you guys.

The research we've done together on the RZM circulars and UM right here surpases anything I've read elsewhere but I know there is so much more that you guys could contribute if you really wanted to. That is my frustration.

[Friedrich-Berthold]

thank you.

[BenVK]

Oh well, happy collecting, I'm waiting on this hat to turn up at the moment. Bought from the most notorious dealer whos been around for 40 years but that everyone avoids and have nothing good at all to say about. I found him to be rather odd but most charming! Bit of a bargain too.

Photos removed, I want to copyright them first.

[Friedrich-Berthold]

Very nice. Well done. Bob Coleman has a similar cap. I failed to buy one of this type that Whammond had. See enclosure

[BenVK]

Thanks FB, I'm sure it will look a lot better in the flesh compared to these poor photos.