The Phantom Sew-On Patch was produced by Best Emblem & Insignia in New York, USA in the 1970s. The sew-on patches are designed to be stitched to clothes, either by hand or a sewing machine.

As with other sew-on patches from this era, very little information is still available about the companies who manufactured, produced and distributed such products.

Additionally, little is know about ‘Best Emblem & Insignia’ (or commonly abbreviated to ‘BEI’) and the extent of their licensing rights. It can be assumed by the small © found on the King Features Syndicate patch line, that they had licensing rights to produce the sew-on patches.

King Features Syndicate comic book characters where widely used by Best Emblem & Insignia, with at least 32 individual sew-on patch designs produced. Theses include, the Phantom, Prince Valiant, Flash Gordon, Annie Rooney, Blondie, Dagwood, Hi, Lois, Katzenjammer Kids Hans, Hans & Fritz, Katzenjammer Kids Captain, Katzenjammer Kids Mama, Katzenjammer Kids The Inspector, Katzenjammer Kids Fritz, Popeye, Olive Oyl, Wimpy, Snuffy Smith, Lowezy, Jughaid, Tillie Jones, The Little King, Little Iodine, Beetle Bailey, Sarge Snorkel, Private Plato, Private Lt Flap, Lt Fuzz, Daisy, Ignatz, Offica Pupp and Mister Breger.

Best Emblem & Insignia also produced a wide range of insignia and humor based patches, all of which were packaged with their trademark red and white header card, which can be seen below.

The Phantom sew-on patches were sold in Woolco stores, housed in a see-through plastic pack with a backing card which folded over at the top. Woolco is a subsidiary of the Woolworth Company, which during the 1970’s had 100 outlets in both the US and Canada.

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