Vietnam era patch legit?

[HOOKED ON HISTORY]

Thank you guys for making this thread a lot more interesting than I could have hoped.

[Flying10uk]

I believe that I now remember where I first became aware of people using tyres to make footwear. I was looking at some of the remains of a Handley Page Hamden bomber, at the RAF Museum, that had crashed/been shot down over Russia during WW2. This wreckage was subsequently purchased by the RAF Museum after being salvaged from it's crash site in Russia. Most of the rubber had been cut off the landing wheel tyres by locals for making footwear, if memory serves me correctly.

[Peter Laidler]

Yes............... but it hadn't been recovered when I saw the VC sandals so to me, a 20 year old in 1967, abroad for the first time from sheltered boarding school, apprentice school background, tyres converted into shoes were a real eye-opener.

[Flying10uk]

Me too, when I first saw those aircraft wheels with all the rubber cut off and just a tiny bit of the tyre remaining around the rim of the wheel.

[Paul S.]

Talking of which........ Does anyone remember those what we used to call 'VC sandals'? sort of shoe things, made from the treads of old lorry/car tyres, and shaped into sort of something you wear on your feet? I don't know where they found tyres with tread on them because all the old trucks and lorries seemed to have tyres that were as bald as a badgers arse! To be honest, you couldn't really describe these 'shoes' to anyone in words alone

They were also called 'Ho Chi Minhs'. They actually were for when you really needed to get the boots off for a bit.

The only things I sent home that I can admit to without raising the possible interest of a Crown Prosecutor was an Ao Dia for my then fiancé, later wife, (miles too small for her) and a kiddie-sized set of 'tiger stripes' for a neighbour's little boy at my mother's request.

[Paul S.]

RE the above - Typo. It should read: They were actually good for when ...

[HOOKED ON HISTORY]

I like the photos of the auxiliary fuel tanks made into boats.
Inventive farmers build vital river boats out of fuel tanks jettisoned from U.S. planes during the Vietnam War | Daily Mail Online