{"product_id":"vintage-embroidered-tiger-patch-nos-1-stylized-face-design-yellow-black","title":"Vintage Mid Century 1960s Embroidered Tiger Patch 🐯 – NOS Stylized Face Design (Yellow Black)","description":"\u003ch2\u003eRemember Tiger Fever? 🐯 Vintage 1960s Embroidered Tiger Patch, NOS 1¼\"\u003c\/h2\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eSize:\u003c\/strong\u003e 1 1\/4\" x 1 1\/4\"\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cdiv style=\"max-width:315px;margin:0 auto 20px;\"\u003e\u003cdiv style=\"position:relative;padding-bottom:177.78%;height:0;overflow:hidden;\"\u003e\u003ciframe src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/Zmom_p4gh2U\" style=\"position:absolute;top:0;left:0;width:100%;height:100%;\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer;autoplay;clipboard-write;encrypted-media;gyroscope;picture-in-picture\" allowfullscreen\u003e\u003c\/iframe\u003e\u003c\/div\u003e\u003c\/div\u003e\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eIn the 1960s, America had tiger fever.\u003c\/strong\u003e Drivers were told to put a tiger in their tank and hung striped tails off their gas caps. Triumph's Tiger was the motorcycle to be seen on. Tony the Tiger was on the breakfast table, and \"Tiger Force\" was the name a hand-picked unit of American paratroopers carried into Vietnam.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\n\n\u003cp\u003eSomewhere in all of that, somebody ran off little tiger faces like this one by the bag — no brand, no lettering, so they could be sold to anyone who wanted a tiger on a jacket, a cap or a riding vest. Nobody wrote down who made them. These never got sewn on.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\n\u003ch2\u003e🐯 What This Is\u003c\/h2\u003e\n\n\u003cp\u003eA small embroidered tiger-face emblem, roughly \u003cstrong\u003e1 1\/4\"\u003c\/strong\u003e across. The face is worked in three threads: hot yellow for the fur, dense black for the stripes, muzzle and outline, and bright white for the teeth, the eyes and the ruff under the chin.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\n\u003cp\u003eIt is a \u003cem\u003estylized\u003c\/em\u003e tiger, not a naturalistic one — symmetrical, front-facing, stripes simplified into flame-shaped spikes, teeth drawn as a hard white block. A mark, not a portrait, drawn to survive being shrunk.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\n\u003ch2\u003e✂️ Cut To The Tiger — No Border\u003c\/h2\u003e\n\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eThere is no merrowed edge.\u003c\/strong\u003e No rolled overlock stitch running round the outside. The emblem is embroidered solid onto a backing cloth and then \u003cstrong\u003ecut to the silhouette\u003c\/strong\u003e, so the outline follows the ears, the cheek tufts and the ruff. You can see the pale backing as a narrow margin at the edge in the photographs.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\n\u003cp\u003eThat borderless, cut-edge machine embroidery is a different route from the merrowed shield sold on a card. It is how emblems were made to be \u003cstrong\u003eapplied\u003c\/strong\u003e — bought by the dozen or the bag and sewn onto something else. Collectors of 1960s and 1970s patches know the look well; it is the same cut-edge style as the tiger patches made in Korea and Vietnam for American units in those years.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\n\u003cp\u003eAnd with no border eating the outer millimetre, every bit of the 1 1\/4\" is tiger.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\n\u003ch2\u003e📅 How Old It Is\u003c\/h2\u003e\n\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eMid-century — the 1960s.\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\n\u003cp\u003eThis tiger came in a single find of unused patches, all new old stock, none ever sewn. The pieces in that find that date themselves run from 1950s–60s felt-ground state and youth-baseball emblems to a \u003cstrong\u003eBundy Corporation\u003c\/strong\u003e company patch that cannot be older than 1967, the year that company took that name. The tiger's cut-edge construction sits comfortably in the middle of those same years. There is no printed date on it, so that is as tight as the evidence goes.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\n\u003ch2\u003e⛽ \"Put A Tiger In Your Tank\"\u003c\/h2\u003e\n\n\u003cp\u003eThe line was written in \u003cstrong\u003eApril 1959\u003c\/strong\u003e by \u003cstrong\u003eEmery T. Smyth\u003c\/strong\u003e, a copywriter in the Chicago office of the agency Needham, Louis \u0026amp; Brorby, for the Oklahoma Oil Company — a Midwestern arm of Humble Oil, part of the old Standard Oil family that sold its gasoline as Esso, Enco and Humble depending on where you lived. In \u003cstrong\u003eMay 1964\u003c\/strong\u003e the cartoon tiger went national. Its most famous giveaway was a striped \u003cstrong\u003etiger tail\u003c\/strong\u003e to hang off the car; one account credits the tails to an independent marketing man, \u003cstrong\u003eJoseph L. Heimbold\u003c\/strong\u003e, and puts sales at a quarter of a million.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\n\u003cp\u003eBy 1964 tigers were so thick on the ground in American advertising that \u003cem\u003eTime\u003c\/em\u003e magazine called it \u003cstrong\u003e\"The Year of the Tiger.\"\u003c\/strong\u003e A small tiger face on a jacket in those years did not need explaining.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\n\u003ch2\u003e🏍️ The Tiger On Two Wheels\u003c\/h2\u003e\n\n\u003cp\u003eFor riders, \"Tiger\" meant Triumph. \u003cstrong\u003eEdward Turner\u003c\/strong\u003e designed the \u003cstrong\u003eTiger 100\u003c\/strong\u003e in 1939 as a sports machine for enthusiasts — the \"100\" was its claimed top speed in miles an hour. German bombs destroyed the Triumph works in Coventry in 1940, production came back in 1946, and the Tiger 100 stayed in the range until 1973. In 1954 a 650 joined it, the \u003cstrong\u003eTiger 110\u003c\/strong\u003e, with the same promise built into the name.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\n\u003cp\u003eTiger emblems went where the riders went — onto jackets, vests and the backs of denim — alongside shop names, club marks and whatever else a rider thought belonged there.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\n\u003ch2\u003e🥣 The Tiger At Breakfast\u003c\/h2\u003e\n\n\u003cp\u003eIn 1952 Kellogg's of Battle Creek, Michigan launched Sugar Frosted Flakes and needed a face for the box. Art director \u003cstrong\u003eEugene Kolkey\u003c\/strong\u003e at the Leo Burnett agency designed a tiger, named him \u003cstrong\u003eTony\u003c\/strong\u003e after a Burnett ad man called Raymond Anthony Wells, and had illustrator \u003cstrong\u003eMartin Provensen\u003c\/strong\u003e draw the finished art. The story goes that Tony was up against Katy the Kangaroo, Elmo the Elephant and Newt the Gnu. Within a year the others were gone and the tiger had the job for good — which is how a generation of baby boomers grew up with a tiger at the table.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\n\u003ch2\u003e🪖 Tiger Force\u003c\/h2\u003e\n\n\u003cp\u003eIn \u003cstrong\u003eNovember 1965\u003c\/strong\u003e, Major \u003cstrong\u003eDavid Hackworth\u003c\/strong\u003e formed a platoon-sized long-range reconnaissance unit of about 45 paratroopers inside the \u003cstrong\u003e101st Airborne Division\u003c\/strong\u003e to, in his words, \"out-guerrilla the guerrillas.\" They called it \u003cstrong\u003eTiger Force\u003c\/strong\u003e, and it became one of the most decorated — and hardest-hit — small units of the war. Tiger emblems made in-country and in Korea came home on the uniforms and jackets of the men who served there.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\n\u003ch2\u003e🏫 Why An Unlettered Tiger Sold To Everybody\u003c\/h2\u003e\n\n\u003cp\u003eA tiger is a mascot animal. Schools, teams, clubs, fuel brands, cereal boxes and army units all used one, and a small tiger face with no lettering on it belongs to all of them and none of them. \u003cstrong\u003eThat is deliberate.\u003c\/strong\u003e An emblem with no name could go on a school jacket in Ohio, a riding vest in California or a GI's souvenir jacket, and it is why a design like this ran and ran.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\n\u003ch2\u003e✅ Condition\u003c\/h2\u003e\n\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eNew old stock.\u003c\/strong\u003e Unused, never sewn to anything. The yellow is still hot, the black is dense and unfaded, the white has not yellowed. The embroidery is tight across the whole face with the stitch direction intact, and the cut edge is clean.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\n\u003ch2\u003e🖼️ What People Do With These\u003c\/h2\u003e\n\n\u003cul\u003e\n  \u003cli\u003eSewn to a denim jacket, riding vest, cap or battle jacket, where a small emblem fills a gap a big patch cannot\u003c\/li\u003e\n  \u003cli\u003eGrouped with other small emblems on one panel — animals, marks and mascots read well in a grid\u003c\/li\u003e\n  \u003cli\u003eFramed as a graphic object in its own right; at this size it works like a printer's ornament\u003c\/li\u003e\n  \u003cli\u003eGiven to someone whose team, school or town is the Tigers — or who rides a Triumph Tiger\u003c\/li\u003e\n  \u003cli\u003eUsed in visible mending, where a small dense emblem covers a hole without announcing itself as a patch\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003c\/ul\u003e\n\u003ch3\u003e🐯 About these\u003c\/h3\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThe supply is finite - once these last unused 1960s tiger patches are gone, they'll be very difficult to acquire.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cdiv class=\"relatedBlock\"\u003e\n\u003ch3\u003e🔎 More From The Vintage \u0026amp; Antique Gifts Archive\u003c\/h3\u003e\n\u003cul\u003e\n\u003cli\u003e\u003ca href=\"https:\/\/vintageantiquesgifts.com\/products\/vintage-half-grapefruit-lemon-soda-cork-bottle-cap-1950s-discover\"\u003eVintage Half Grapefruit Half Lemon Soda Cork-Lined Crown 🍋 Bottle Cap NOS Mid-Century Citrus Soda Lithographed Yellow Black\u003c\/a\u003e\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003e\u003ca href=\"https:\/\/vintageantiquesgifts.com\/products\/vintage-1980s-bikes-candy-fund-raiser-patch-beich-bloomington-illinois\"\u003eVintage 1980s Bike's Name Patch 🏍️ Biker Vest, Cycling \u0026amp; Bike Shop Patch, Paul F. Beich Candy Fund Raiser, Bloomington Illinois, Embroidered\u003c\/a\u003e\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003e\u003ca href=\"https:\/\/vintageantiquesgifts.com\/products\/vintage-1960s-adults-at-play-decal-mid-century-nos-americana-amarillo-tx\"\u003eVintage 1960s “Adults at Play” Decal 😜 — NOS Baxter Lane Co. Mid‑Century Americana\u003c\/a\u003e\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003c\/ul\u003e\n\u003c\/div\u003e","brand":"Vintage and Antique Gifts","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":53127745962265,"sku":"VAG-9194882466024","price":5.5,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/1003\/0153\/7561\/files\/il_fullxfull.7131927443_5u86.jpg?v=1788994138","url":"https:\/\/touchofmodern.com\/products\/vintage-embroidered-tiger-patch-nos-1-stylized-face-design-yellow-black","provider":"Touch of Modern","version":"1.0","type":"link"}