I now present them using a rewards and recognition criteria, similarly set up by the Commandant's "PEP Awards" which basically is units can submit requests to me, and I will make the determination on who gets them. I try to keep it at a level close to an LOC, although having earned a personal award is not a requirement. Although I do not have any special criteria other than I make every attempt to present them as a quick reward and recognition item to members I either know have done an exceptional job, or when it's brought to my attention.

You may have heard of an issue that came up a couple of weeks ago where an Air Force Staff Sergeant (E-5), openly auctioned off one of my coins on the eBay internet site. In my communication to him, which you may want to take a look on my website, under http://www.uscg.mil/hq/mcpocg/1faq/coin.htm provides a pretty good explanation of just how I and my counterparts view the use and distribution of our recognition coins.

Just as with myself, my E-10 counterparts, along with other service chiefs, including the Commandant, presents a personal coin for similar reasons. I don't quite know what the estimate of how many senior officers and senior enlisted members have their own or unit type coins, but I'm told it numbers somewhere in the 5-6,000 plus range.

While I'm at it, a little background about those coins as to how they came about. There are probably dozens of stories of the origin of the coin. While I was attending the U. S. Army Sergeants Major Academy in 1997, I did a little research project on trying to find the origin of the coin presentation. Here's an interesting story I found in a 1969 issue of "Soldier Magazine" that offered this story for a collaboration of stories from several Army members. As I said, it's one of many, but this is the one I tend to use in my explanation of the coin.

The practice of a senior enlisted member presenting a coin or medallion to an individual actually goes back just about 100 years ago in the British Army. During the War of the Boars,  the officers were the only ones authorized to receive medals. Whenever an enlisted person did a good job - typically the officer he was assigned to would receive the award. The Regimental SgtMaj would sneak into the officer's tent, cut the medal from the ribbon. He would then call an all hands to formally "shake the hand" of the exceptional soldier, and would "palm the medal" in the soldier's hand without anyone knowing. The officers of course would sort of know what was going on, and typically condoned the action, as many often felt ill-at ease in accepting the medal in the first place - although there were a few exceptions. Whenever that would happen, other officers would cover for the enlisted men by blaming it on the nearby civilians who often stole goods from the army camps.

As time went on, the coin recognition was eventually extended to the American forces in WWI - by then of course the British Army began recognizing their own enlisted soldiers. The coin turned into a recognition piece which was specially struck with the unit's crest on it. Senior NCOs presented them as their form of recognition, since they were not authorized to present any medals or awards. In Vietnam, the coin took a different twist of recognition -- it became known as the "challenge coin" in which those who had them, would slam them on the bar counter to challenge anyone in the bar if they had one - it was one of those Combat "machismo" thing. If a person didn't have a coin, they would have to buy the bar a round of drinks.

As I mentioned earlier, there are several variations of the "coin story." Today, the coin is pretty much widely used throughout all of the military forces in the world, both as a form

of recognition, and even in some cases as a "calling card."