Need help identifying unusual version of TSB 4 year medal
Posted: Thu Apr 04, 2013 4:39 pm
Hi there, a good friend recently gave me some coins from her deceased father's collection, this was among them and it has me totally stumped. I've seen many hundreds of these Toronto School Board 4 years good conduct medals and have all the official versions of it except the official PW Ellis version, I was outbid at the last second on ebay last time I saw one there. This is stamped PW Ellis but its completely unlike the official version by PW Ellis I've seen or any other one. Its not just the small details but major design elements that are different. Its the same size as the usual versions of these medals. The friend who gave it to me has no information on it at all.
I have a couple of theories about it, the one I prefer is that its a design test by PW Ellis, the other is that its a counterfeit but I couldn't figure out why anyone would bother counterfeiting such a thing and then get it so visibly "wrong". I also couldn't figure out why PW Ellis wouldn't have done their design test on paper. It appears to have been struck at least twice, as you'll see some design elements are fairly crude while others are quite refined, there's also a couple of die cracks in it.
If anyone could help me identify this I'd greatly appreciate it, thanks!
I have a couple of theories about it, the one I prefer is that its a design test by PW Ellis, the other is that its a counterfeit but I couldn't figure out why anyone would bother counterfeiting such a thing and then get it so visibly "wrong". I also couldn't figure out why PW Ellis wouldn't have done their design test on paper. It appears to have been struck at least twice, as you'll see some design elements are fairly crude while others are quite refined, there's also a couple of die cracks in it.
If anyone could help me identify this I'd greatly appreciate it, thanks!