Thursday, April 11, 2019

Heraldry I Almost Saw


So there we were, driving down the highway, me dutifully keeping my eyes on the road. (I will sometimes notice heraldry while I'm driving, as a few of my previous posts will demonstrate, but it's usually on the vehicle immediately in front of me.) We ended up passing a truck which had a coat of arms logo on its side. I didn't see it at all (again, watching the road!) and my wife didn't have sufficient time to pull out her phone and take a picture of it. (To someone as old as I am now, that phrase seems weird. Why would one take out a phone to take a picture. Aren't pictures something you take with a camera? But here we are in the 21st Century, taking pictures with our phones.)

Anyway, she made herself a note of the name on the truck and looked it up when we got home, and then sent me a link to their website.

I typed in the URL and sure enough, there on the website of Protect Environmental Services, Inc. was this shield that they are using as their logo:

I'd blazon it as Gules three bars [enarched] or. (The enarching is not very pronounced, and could easily be considered as artistic license, trying to show the curvature of the shield.)

Their website (http://www.protectusa.net/) indicates that they do hazardous materials cleanup and disposal in north and central Texas, and that they are the emergency response contractor for the Texas Department of Transportation in this area.

Kind of cool, doing good work like that, but I am especially pleased at the simplicity, not to say good heraldic style, of their logo.

The design is not unique; Papworth's Ordinary of British Armorials shows Gules three bars or borne by: Beaumont, Berry, de Bury, Blackford/Blakford, Blakeford, Cameron, Muschampe, Poynings, and St. Owen.

But the fact that it is found used by that many families, whether related to each other or not, is a fair demonstration of its being good heraldry.

Congratulations to PES, Inc. I'm sorry I missed seeing your truck while driving down the six-lane highway in Dallas. Maybe if you had been right in front of me ....


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