hunyadi

Post a photo of your daughter... then I will beleive you.

Kevin - Dont know a while lot about the origanization. We have a thread on the membership badges here http://gmic.co.uk/index.php?showtopic=15508 but nothing concrete. From my own resraech the organization, though having a nice and elaborate name, was a sporting organization meant to foster physical fitness and the like. Later in the 1950's it melded in with another sports organization the 'Hungarian Army Sports Associtation'. So I would venture from the 'Freedom Fighter' name and the melding with the military sport organization - the idea was more of a para-military organization. Perhaps Zsolt could shed more light on the subject.

Nice little badge from the 1950's. From my understanding this is a placement badge for shooting within the sports association kown as the 'Magyar Szabadsagharcos Szovetseg' (Hungarian Freedom Fighters Associaiton)

Interestinlgy enough so did mine - however he was captured and given the choice of an English prison or the American colonies as a slave for 12 years with the express warning that he could never return. Being a slave was not so bad - at the end of his life he owned a huge plantation in what is now Maryland.

Here is my ancestor - http://www.geocities.com/jthughes614/

I was rooting for you Gordon!

There are also some questionable storage practices of some dealers that will render many enameled pieces to be damaged as well.

Ulstermann - Going off what I translated from the Blue Bible (1978) - the awarding went as follows - B) There are three requirements to attain ?Socialist Brigade? (Szocialista Brig?d) title or the ?Excellent Workers Brigade? or the ?Excellent Youth Brigade?. First all titles are given out for the exemplary accomplishments carried out during the period of one year. Secondly additional awards can only be given out after the required previous title is bestowed upon the collective. Thirdly the title must have the appropriate proof and documentation that the collective was able to exceed their yearly pledged goals. These titles do not carry any monetary award. The ?Socialist Brigade? title is given on the occasion of the first year of service. Each member of the collective is to personally receive a certificate of the title. For the second instance in which the ?Socialist Brigade? title is given, a small green wreathed badge is bestowed in three classes: gold, silver and bronze. The next highest class is awarded when the members of the collective already poses the previous grade. Proof by certificate is required for individuals to be awarded the next highest class. Perhaps there are others out there that can shed more light on the subject of the 'first badge' given out - as only a 'bronze' colored badge seems to have come with the green enameled wreath - if you look at the other previous posts where the badge's are silver or gold in color they do not have the green wreath. I posed the question to the director of medals at the National Musuem and showed him the regulation and he was just as confused as I was and explained it away as something that was probably called for - but never follwoed through with.

Hi Christian - this seems to be the 3rd Class - or the first award given out. The sivler and the gold grade do not have an enameled wreath (strangely enough).

Chris - that is a good question, but as I dont have the answer I can not help myslef from saying the most stupid reply to a post I amy ever make here.... The Germans

Detail of the reverse. The seller tried to jack the price up becasue he claimed that the badge is made of solid silver (!) I am going to assume that these are heavy plated and not solid? Dealers are funny - its like he was expecting me to melt it down for more 'value'...

Well - now I have a problem - my second Yugoslavian award... Another Five Torch type in the case - but no ribbon.

That is a bit of an odd one - probably a German sports medal case melded with a bravery medal...

thanks for the comments - strangely enough I found it in a box of mixed Hungarian items. By the serial number is there any way to give an aproximate date of manufacture. Yugoslavian is a place I just dont know very well.

compare the enamel work from the 1970's...

the convex reverse

Hi Bifter - I think you may be experiencing faults that happened to items in the late 1970's and into the 1980's. Generaly these were cold enamel work and the Hungarian Mint was experiencing the downfall of the Socialist economy. The other factor that I find causes such defects is actual neglect and wear. Most of the time these things were tossed into the drawer and forgotten about until the end of communism when they ended up in the trash only to be picked up by trash pickers to be resold at the flea-markets. I try to collect items from the early years when quality was much better - but even then the integral design caused many problems, take for instance the Order of Merit of the HUPR of 1949. The star has a massive convex to the star and the enamel, though of good quality is thin because of the design - wear it one the medal bar and it gets dinged around. When that happens you generaly see damage to the 5 o'clock arm of the star. Or just drop the thing once and the enamel is damaged. I have a bornze class that sat in my display case and just from the rapid change in temperature and barometric pressure - it popped a section of the enamel off!

and the reverse

My first Yugo - well, I used to fix them but thats a different field... I must say the quality is amazing - considering that a Hungarian counterpart of this level was only seen in the early days of the Hungarian Peoples Repbulic.

Hi Zsolt - I was trying to see if anoyone picked up on the missing ' from the last "O" in "Dolgoz?" but no one caught it...

Gordon - interestingly enough these are the only ones I have found. But I dont really look for them much - it was your interest that sparked me . I also cant recal seeing too many of the whistles - and hardly any lanyards. I am still looking for the Kisdobos belt and the Utt?rő belt as well - If I recall there was a dagger as well? But all in all - its amazing to me that not more of these come to the market - but I can imagine that so many ended up in the landfills after 89'...

Though I am not as vered in the KISZ movement as others - I was able to pick up these rather difficult to find uniforms. Its an interesting dillema as every child who wanted to go to school was required to join - so there should be a nearly unlimited supply of these - but these are the first two that I have been able to find. The nice part is that they are nearly complete.

But they also had a bunch of cool posters

Thats becasue we bought them all..... But back to the musuem - here is the "tone" of some plackards which left me the with the feeling of 'look what they did to us'.

About a year ago I got a Prinzengrosse EK that looks similar to yours - can you post some close ups for comparison?