Buyer Beware! Avoid Replicas, Fakes And Fantasy Texas Ranger Badges
Each year replicas and forgeries of Texas Ranger badges are offered on web sites, at auctions and at gun shows. Some are truthfully advertised as replicas or fantasy badges, others are carefully…
by Byron Johnson
Each year replicas and forgeries of Texas Ranger badges are offered on web sites, at auctions and at gun shows. Some are truthfully advertised as replicas or fantasy badges, others are carefully crafted to mislead collectors and enthusiasts.
What to watch out for:
- Meaningless descriptions such as: “vintage,” “obsolete,” and “antique”
- Hearsay: “This was carried by a friend of my father way back, don’t remember his name.”
- Unsupported opinion: “I think,” “I believe” and “it just feels right”
- Unverifiable letters of authenticity and meaningless affidavits
- Opinions from “experts” — in collusion with the seller
- Vague references to “a small town museum going out of business,” “estate sales,” “old Rangers” or a “well-known recently deceased collector”
- Unenforceable verbal guarantees
- “All sales final” statements
“When our living history performers travel around the state, people bring us their “old” Ranger badges supposedly made in the 1880s. You would not believe how many people buy fake badges — especially the Ranger Company “A” badges — off the internet or at gun shows. I would say that 95% of them are the fake Company “A” badge. So far no one has shown us an authentic, documented Texas Ranger badge. The only real badges we see are on the Rangers who come by to visit.”
— Jim Ryan, Texas Rangers reenactor
The following appeared on the Yahoo! auction site. The badge—a Langenbacker fantasy badge (see below) or a copy—was distressed to look old. The ad is carefully worded to avoid prosecution. Instead of “it is,” the seller relies on the unsupported “I believe.”
Ad for “Old 1890s Texas Ranger Badge”
I noticed there are a lot of fakes out there, but I will tell you this one is not. … It is hard to find one like this that was actually used and in this good of shape. I can’t find anything wrong with it, 1 but it does need to be cleaned.2 This and some other things … came from an old small town Museum in the heart of Texas. The funding dried up for the Museum, 3 I was able to get a hold of a few of the items, this is a great chance for you to get a piece of history. I have described my item as best as possible! I’m not an expert at every thing I sell, I am going by what Museum personnel has (sic) told me.4 Please ask all questions before you place your bid.5
Can you spot the suspicious statements?
1 The seller states that he has no expertise; how can he tell whether the badge is a fake? How could he “not find anything wrong with it” if he has no knowledge of badges?
2 Distressing an item to look worn and adding dirt are easy to do.
3 What old small town museum? Where? This can be easily verified. Private non-profit and government museums (city, county and state) employ trained staffs and rarely close. For-profit attractions, some calling themselves “museums” or “collections” do occasionally sell their collections.
4 What museum and personnel? How can buyers verify his statements if the museum and location are are unnamed and the museum is conveniently closed?
5 Translation: All Sales Final.
What makes badge fraud possible
- Failure to thoroughly research purchases, and demand guarantees, before buying.
- Disclaimers such as “all sales final,” “sold as is,” “ask all questions before buying”
- Sellers hiding behind PO Boxes, e-mail aliases, anonymous accounts and false/temporary phone numbers
- Failure to use escrow services to assure delivery
- Buyers dropping the matter out of embarrassment after being taken
- Lack of monitoring of sales or enforcement of policies by Internet auctions and sales sites
What are My Chances of Finding an Authentic Early or Modern Texas Ranger Badge?
Early Texas Ranger Badges — c. 1874-1935
The chance of finding an early Texas Ranger badge on EBay is about the same as winning the lottery.
The first references to Texas Ranger badges appear in the mid-1870s. The State of Texas did not provide Texas Rangers with badges, nor did they require that Rangers wear them, until 1935. Hence, Rangers wore badges between the 1870s and 1935 but they were not “official.” The few Ranger who wore Badges ordered them from jewelers, gunsmiths and early police supply companies or received them as gifts from grateful citizens.
As a result, pre-1935 Texas Ranger badges were of many sizes, shapes, designs and materials. It is impossible to authenticate an early Texas Ranger badge based on composition, manufacture or condition.
Many who buy Texas Ranger badges do so solely on faith and appearance. Dig deep — you will find no verifiable chain of ownership (provenance) leading back to a specific Ranger. Only apocryphal stories and glib statements like “looks right,” “looks old,” “feels right” and “let me tell you the story.”
Patina (the surface appearance of an item) dirt and wear are not indicators of age or authenticity. In fact, forgers spend countless hours making a badges and other items “look right.”
In the 1800s European craftsmen made highly accurate replicas of 300-year-old suits of armor almost indistinguishable from the originals. Why? Wealthy German collectors sought to recapture their Teutonic past by decorating estates and castles with armor, swords and helmets.
Today, these replica arms and armor occasionally shows up at auction mistaken for originals. The craftsmanship and more than a century of wear and tear have fooled experts.
They say possession is 9/10ths of the law, but it is not a guarantee of authenticity. One hears comments like “the collector had it since the 1960s How could it not be real?!?”
Sorry, but bogus Texas Ranger badges have been made since at least the 1930s. Forgers used the materials, engraving styles, designs and fasteners common to the 19th and early 20th centuries.
This article shows many purported 19th and early 20th century badges as well as real modern examples. Some of the badges shown may be real, but no hard evidence is presented proving it.
The author correctly notes how rare early Texas Ranger badges are, but then paradoxically states that that some of the examples are unquestionably authentic — based on their “look-and-feel” and the fact that that they were they were owned by well-known collectors. There is no documentation of chain of ownership.
The Golden Rule
A documented chain-of-ownership from a specific Ranger to today—with no significant gaps—is the only strong evidence that an early Texas Ranger badge may be authentic.
You can find more information about the different authentic or fake Texas Rangers badges here or visit the Texas Ranger Hall of Fame and Museum at www.texasranger.org.
Byron Johnson, Director is the Texas Ranger Hall of Fame and Museum
