Item:
ONACST2209

Original U.S. WWI Early War Signal Corps Aviation Section Officer Collar Insignia - 1917 Pattern Rare Riveted Wings

Item Description

Original Items: Only One Set Available. Now this is a rare pair of collar devices to come across. These were considered unauthorized for wear up until 1917 when an official insignia design was made. These may look like normal U.S. Army Signal Corps collar devices but what makes them rare is the fact that there are wings riveted to them and not soldered on like the later devices. Truly a beautiful and genuine pair!
 
Until August of 1917 there were no regulations governing the prescribed insignia for the “Aviation Section” of the Signal Corps.  This pair of “unauthorized” collar insignia is one type of several known styles worn by officers in the Air Service until the new regulation authorized wear of the Wings and Prop. These are unmarked insignia and have silver wings applied over the signal flags. Both have functioning pin backs with flat wire catches undamaged.
 
Arrives ready for display!

Aviation Section, U.S. Signal Corps
The Aviation Section, Signal Corps, was the aerial warfare service of the United States from 1914 to 1918, and a direct statutory ancestor of the United States Air Force. It absorbed and replaced the Aeronautical Division, Signal Corps, and conducted the activities of Army aviation until its statutory responsibilities were suspended by President Woodrow Wilson in 1918. The Aviation Section organized the first squadrons of the aviation arm and conducted the first military operations by United States aviation on foreign soil.
 
The Aviation Section, Signal Corps was created by the 63rd Congress (Public Law 143) on 18 July 1914 after earlier legislation to make the aviation service independent from the Signal Corps died in committee. From July 1914 until May 1918 the aviation section of the Signal Corps was familiarly known by the title of its administrative headquarters component at the time, seen variously as the Aeronautical Division, Air Division, Division of Military Aeronautics, and others. For historic convenience, however, the air arm is most commonly referred to by its official designation, the Aviation Section, Signal Corps (ASSC), and is the designation recognized by the United States Air Force as its predecessor for this period.
 
The Aviation Section began in turbulence, first as an alternative to making aviation in the Army a corps independent of the Signal Corps, then with friction between its pilots, who were all young and on temporary detail from other branches, and its leadership, who were more established Signal Corps officers and non-pilots. Despite the assignment of Lieutenant Colonel George O. Squier as chief to bring stability to Army aviation, the Signal Corps found itself wholly inadequate to the task of supporting the Army in combat after the United States entered World War I on 6 April 1917. It attempted to expand and organize a competent arm but its efforts were largely chaotic and in the spring of 1918 aviation was removed, first from the jurisdiction of the Office of the Chief of Signal where it had resided since its inception, and then from the Signal Corps altogether. The duties of the section were not resumed following World War I and it was formally disestablished by the creation of the Air Service in 1920.

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