One of my acquisitions at the 19th Annual Kintecoying TOR last weekend was a variation need of the Wakpominee Lodge 1994 NOAC S8a and S8b.
There are distinct differences in both the blue sky and green grass.
The Blue Book stats are:
S8a PUR R M/C RED DYL FDL; NOAC94; bright GRN mtns
S8b PUR R M/C RED DYL FDL; NOAC94; dull, darker GRN mtns
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“This is the issue: whether we believe in our capacity for self-government or whether we abandon the American Revolution and confess that a little intellectual elite in a far distant capital can plan our lives for us better than we can plan them for ourselves. … Somewhere a perversion has taken place. Our natural, inalienable rights are now considered to be a dispensation of government, and freedom has never been so fragile, so close to slipping from our grasp as it is at this moment.” Ronald Reagan
There were actually four different patches in this NOAC set. The 2 variants that you have noted here were fund raising patches (not service patches as shown in the ebay pictures on this patch). There was a third patch with a different border issued for those Lodge members attending NOAC and then a fourth patch was issued after a Lodge member received recognition for his performance of Allowat Sakima in the Ceremonial Competition at that NOAC. All of the later issue were then signed by the scout in question on the back and numbered. An interesting note is that when the initial fund raising patches were received the youth never noticed that there had been a thread change on the run and sold a number of the patches before I saw them. As soon as I saw the patches I told them that there was a color change due to a thread change. So the lodge never had a count of the number of each they actually received. And while a variant, it was a variant caused by the manufacturer not a separate order. Several points on other of the Wakpominee patches displayed for ebay sale. The all black and all white ‘ghost’ patches were not the first ‘ghost’ patches issued by the lodge. When the first Wakpominee flap patches were issued in the late 1950’s the lodge totem, the sitting gray squirrel was outlined in white on the flap. For years that was known as the Wakpominee ‘ghost’ patch since the squirrel was not fully embroidered. This was emphasized first when the fuly embroided white squirrel patch was introduced, followed by the fully embroidered gray squirrel. Enough time had passed from those issues that when the the late 1990 patches were produced that the youth had little or no knowledge of the earlier patches. Finally the 1988 NOAC issue was actually a private issue that had not been authorized by the lodge when it was produced but the lodge accepted it afterwards as an official lodge flap. I was an active Wakpominee Lodge member from 1960 through the merger in 1999 and served as Lodge Advisor in the early 1970’s.
Joseph,
Thanks for the comment and additional information. This was the firest time I had seen both versions side by side.
While I may have passed by the daker version over the years, I suspect it is the darker version which is the more limited.