U.S. COATS OF ARMS | American College of Heraldry

Full achievement of coat of arms of the
American College of Heraldry.

January 21, 2018 – The American College of Heraldry was organized as a nonprofit in 1972 in New Orleans, Louisiana. It was incorporated as a nonprofit and operates on a charter from the State of Alabama.

The primary contact for the American College of Heraldry is currently in Little Rock, Arkansas.

It provides services to assist American citizens in the design and registration of wholly new armorial bearings, since there is no U.S. Government agency providing such a service. 

The American College of Heraldry works with individuals in designing heraldically correct achievements of arms and issues registrations of such arms, and publishes details of these registrations in its quarterly magazine, The Armiger's News.  The College will also consider application for registration of arms by non-U.S. citizens who have already been granted armorial bearings from an active armorial authority such as the College of Arms in London or the Court of Lord Lyon in Edinburgh. 

The College charges $325 to Americans for assisting in designing and registering a new coat of arms. The charge is slightly higher for non-Americans.

A listing of international groups that grant or register arms is provided by Araltas, which recommends South African heraldry services as free or inexpensive.

The American College of Heraldry should not be confused with a previously established group, The American College of Heraldry and Arms, Inc., which was founded in 1966 and closed down in 1970. It allegedly rejecting one thousand applications for arms, but no records of them have been identified as of the date of this post.