The Health of Military Surplus Stores

[Atticus Finch]

We still have a couple of surplus stores in this area. Saigon Sam's down in Jacksonville is still in operation, last I looked. But there just doesn't seem to be any "surplus" in our surplus stores, anymore. Most of what they sell nowadays seems to be new, knock-off military gear...you know, Rothco, or whatever.

When I was a kid, I used to go to the Army-Navy stores down in Wilmington. The Korean Conflict was over and unpleasantness in Vietnam was still a year or two away. Those stores sold tons of real, WWI and WWII era military gear. It was great. You could buy an issued M-1 helmet and liner for less than five bucks. The real military gear they sold was cheaper than the toy military gear being sold in our local dime stores.

Here's an M-1 I bought in one of those stores. I added the butterbar on the front when I was about ten...maybe to make it look like Lt. Hanley's helmet.

AF

 

[TomS]

I think the web has taken over this kind of retail business. Just my .02 ...

 

[MissMittens]

Nice helmet......is there a seam on the rear, and are the bails swivel or fixed?

 

[Atticus Finch]

Nice helmet......is there a seam on the rear, and are the bails swivel or fixed?

Swivel bails and a rear seam. It may be Korean War vintage or, perhaps, late WWII.

But here's a front-seam M-1, in what's left of Navy grey paint. In the mid-sixties, it was dredged from the bottom of the Atlantic and given to me by a local trawler captain. Back then, North Carolina fishing boats frequently caught such relics left over from the Battle of the Atlantic.

AF

 

[MissMittens]

Nice find.......it's in surprisingly good condition for a helmet that spent more than 20 yrs under water

 

[Atticus Finch]

Nice find.......it's in surprisingly good condition for a helmet that spent more than 20 yrs under water

I suspect that it was buried in mud. Sea trawls have heavy tickler chains that dig up the ocean's bottom in front of the mouth of the trawl as the trawl is pulled foward. The helmet's liner was still in the shell, but was completely rotted and covered with marine life. I just threw it away. I remember cleaning the shell with my mom's bathroom brush and dish washing soap.

AF