Tolkien buttons

In the article I found in Vox Latina (2021) that contains Hardie's oration, there is a footnote that says, roughly (original is in Latin)

There are articles written in Mallorn and published by the American Tolkien Society since the 1970s. On the Internet I saw a picture of a bank with the inscription "Frodo lives". I think there was also a brooch with the inscription "The Great Wizard Lives".

It is not clear to me if this footnote is from Hardie, or from the Vox Latina article author in question, Marcus Cristini though. The latter seems much more likely.

I have not seen anything that says "The Great Wizard Lives" myself that I can recall. I've seen plenty of "Frodo Lives" and "Go Go Gandalf" buttons/badges though, so it is possible that Hardie conflated the two together - also quite possible that in the 1970s the GWL button/badge existed and just isn't documented well at this time!

Thanks for asking, that was fun to do a bit of research on this afternoon.

Thanks, I have been working from that Vox Latina article myself, preparing a translation of Hardie's oration for a blog post. As you say, I think Hardie has conflated two buttons into one. There are a couple of other odd comments Hardie makes which suggest he is working from memory in some places and remembering incorrectly. For example he says that Plutarch says that there are 167 worlds, but Plutarch actually says 183. He also says that rabbit is eaten once in Tolkien's works, but it is eaten both in The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings. So there I think he is remembering "Of Herbs and Stewed Rabbit." The footnotes are by the author of the Vox Latina article.

Here's an anecdote that remembers a "Gandalf Lives" button. I'm certain the image included in the article is not a real button. It's a nice story at least.

https://www.bookologymagazine.com/knock-knock/gandalf_lives