I'm with you Chuck. I retired in '94 and don't ever remember seeing a single coin or even hearing about them.
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Show us your coins!!
- Thread starter HeyJoe
- Start date
They weren’t a Navy thing when I retired in 1998. Army Generals had started giving them out but it was still rare. The running joke by the USN, USAF & USMC at SOUTHCOM when I retired was that a Army guy would rather get a coin then a medal as medals in the Army were given out like candy but coins were hard to get.
Most likely. From what I can gather, they're a by-product of the joint operations and environment we've been in for the last 20 years. They were really only an Army and Air Force thing and have slowly made their way throughout the military and are now even getting passed around in civilian and law enforcement sectors.
I’d add at least ten years to that. I remember being in Oceana Club 30 years ago when some 160th SOAR pilots threw down their coins and we we all stared not knowing what that meant. They were laughing and saying that we were buying because we didn’t have our coins on us. We said ‘What coins?’
We asked where they got them and like AA75 says, it was an Army/Air Force thing out of Korea kinda like the wooden model thing out of the PI. Usually some enterprising senior enlisted married into a family over there and had a ready made Cottage industry producing models, gaudy desk name plates and squadron cruise plaques for the Ready Room or O Club.
I went through more recent than that. Good to know.
They started in WWI when some fancy-pants aero squadron commander had bronze coins struck with the squadron emblem on one side and number on the other. According to the story a pilot was shot down and made his way back toward the allied lines. Picked up by the French, he showed his coin and was taken to his unit. It was sort of carried over after WWII when guys on duty in post-war Germany picked up old Nazi pfennig coins (worthless) and when drinking called out for a “pfennig check”. The guy without one, typically the new kid, had to buy a round. The first “official” coin was the 17th Infantry in Korea and in Vietnam guys who did deep recon would carry a “last round,” the bullet to kill themselves before capture. After a tough LRRP, they would walk into the bar, slam down their round, demand a drink. Their commander eventually decided this was unsafe and ordered the first batch of controlled coins (numbered so each recipient is known). Today the habit is fading away or being replaced to something else like poker chips. Some guys have bowls full, others have just one or two very cherished coins.
The coin thing is not the poker chip thing. The poker chip thing started when Big DoD decided that ringing the bell in the club was encouraging irresponsible consumption of alcohol, because you just gave a free drink to someone who might have otherwise DDed or cut themselves off one drink prior. So the poker chip is a way to still give the bar free drinks, just free drinks they can consume at their leisure, either on that night or some future night.
Coins are just a way for people who are into that thing to record their own career, important people they've met/interacted with, and other events their unit saw fit to make a coin for. And for COs to pass out to folks as a "good job" for day-to-day stuff that doesn't rate a full-on award, but was still a good thing to have done.
I only have one coin...but it’s a good one...it’s a VFA-101 coin from @Python1287. Both @ChuckMK23 and I received a VFA-101 coin directly from Python1287 during a squadron tour that he graciously provided during the amazing “ChuckMK23 & mad dog World Tour” in early 2018.
NOTE: I’m not sure if ChuckMK23 still has his VFA-101 coin...he may have given it to a stripper named “Tiffany” when were driving through Alabama on our way back to Cincinnati.
NOTE: I’m not sure if ChuckMK23 still has his VFA-101 coin...he may have given it to a stripper named “Tiffany” when were driving through Alabama on our way back to Cincinnati.
That is quite a cool “warfare pin” on the FIOC-Georgia coin. Never seen that before.
GroundPounder
Well-Known Member
There are quite a few Navy people there, and all kinds of smart people secret squirrelness. I have a few good friends that are current or recently retired Navy Chiefs that are posted out there. The work they do out there I'm sure has saved American lives here and abroad.
We get all kinds of 3 letter leadership that make frequent visits out there. I have a bunch of coins that I did not show from those types, just because it seems improper to post them. I realize that sounds stupid, but it makes sense to me.
FIOCs should be all DoN personnel (and maybe a couple USCG), right? The NIOCs are the joint ones, and happen to be co-located with certain FIOCs.
GroundPounder
Well-Known Member
If you are asking me, you're barking up the wrong tree, but it does appear to be a " NIOC ". All I can tell you is I'm not smart enough to work there. I got that coin from during an escort for Mr. Brennan so he could tour that location and another building out there.
I don't have more than about a dozen. Not on display, I keep them in the small collection of Navy and LE coffee cups. My son is a wood worker and made a nice display piece for Mrs Wink's small collection of LE coins. Should have him make me one for Fathers Day. Here is four of mine on an uncommon theme.
