News-Antique.com - Mar 31,2008 - There are many interesting features in this special anniversary edition:
Operational Honours
The latest honours and awards from the London Gazette
Disquiet over Hlobane's VC's
The winners and losers of this disastrous offensive
A family history
Another Cardew gives the ulimate sacrifice for his country
The fighting Admiral
Admiral Roger Keyes - a hero of the Zeebrugge raid
The raid on Zeebrugge
Remembering this epic attack on its 90th anniversary
The charge at Harbonniéres
A rare cavalry charge of the Great War
The Insignia of the King's & Queen's Messengers
A fascinating study of these historic badges of office
ANNIVERSARY FEATURE
Celebrating 25 years
Token's silver celebration
Regular features:
THE EDITORIAL
NEWS AND VIEWS
MARKET SCENE
BOOKSHELF
LETTERS TO THE EDITOR
ON PARADE
DEALER'S LISTS
MEDAL TRACKER
CLASSIFIED ADVERTISING
DIARY
EDITORIAL
The Raid on Zeebrugge
The passion survives
UNBELIEVABLY this month marks a real milestone for Token Publishing Ltd. Try as I might I can’t quite get my head around the fact that it has been 25 years since my then wife and myself took the decision to turn our backs on “steady work”, strike out on our own and become our own bosses but we did and now a quarter of a century (and one divorce) later the company has grown considerably—from a small rented office above a plumber’s shop in Hampshire where just two of us could work, to an office “complex” complete with 14 staff in beautiful Devon. Back then we stored the surplus Coin and Medal News magazines in the toilet —today, with not only the two magazines but a huge number of other titles to distribute, we have a purpose built warehouse! We are still very much a family business though and I’m both proud and honoured that my wife Carol and son Philip are very much an integral part of the business, indeed now as I reach my mid-sixties and take a step back a little, it is they who are eager to take Token into the future.
And what a future it is promising to be! Back in 1983 medal collecting was very much the poor relation of the numismatic world with coins still in the ascendancy and medal collecting viewed as something on the fringes of militaria and often tarred with the same brush used to tar the uniform and weapons aficionados. Coins are still enjoying something of a boom, but it is the medal world that has really taken off in recent years. The huge rise in the number of family history enthusiasts and the ease of access to research that the internet brings has led to the market expanding like never before, with thousands, if not hundreds of thousands of people all with an interest in medals and the story they have to tell. True, not all would class themselves as medal collectors, and neither would we want them to be—the prices have gone high enough in recent years without the pressure brought to bear by a mass influx of
