Hungary A MUNKA ?RDEMREND BRONZ FOKOZATA

[Gordon Craig]

ilja559,

Thanks for posting pictures of the earlier awards. Especially the backs. Something I didn't have before. This really ads to the thread.

Regards,

Gordon

[hunyadi]

Early Gold Class of the "16" Ray variety - it could be a variant from the 1950 Order of Labor or one of the 1953 issue. Either way its a rare one.

[hunyadi]

Closer front and reverse shot of the item. I found the medal homeless - but at the last auction I managed to find an empty box with the Order of Labor insert!

[Gordon Craig]

Charles,

Congratulations on getting a case for your award. Now I have to find one for my silver one. I'll post a picture of it tomorrow.

Looking at all of the catalogue pictures shown by Ilya there could be many different ways that this award was made. Unfortunately, we don't get to see enough of these early ones to really get a good comparison of construction, backs etc.

Cheers,

Gordon

[Guest Rick Research]

Since I shall be representing the absent Ulsterman at tomorrow's monthly show (where I hope the only source of Hungarian awards turns up)...

couple of questions not addressed in the Bodrogi/Moln?r/Zeidler book--

did these have to be awarded

bronze first,

second award the bronze holder got a silver,

third award the silver and bronze holder got the gold

or could these be awarded in any of the three grades as an initial award

and were MULTIPLE awards of the same grade possible?

[Gordon Craig]

Rick,

I beleive that these had to be awarded in order from Bronze up. I have never seen more than one class of this award worn at the same time in period photographs. Charles can probably give you a firmer answer when he logs on later today. Good luck at the show. I did ok here in Budapest yesterday.

Regards,

Gordon

[Guest Rick Research]

I started a separate thread on the M1964 Silver class, since this one started out as being for the Bronze, and has now gone all over.

http://gmic.co.uk/index.php?showtopic=24569

There seem to be several distinct, if ? overlapping variations for the M1964--

"3 rivet 2 piece reverse" versus "1 rivet 1 piece flat reverse" but some of either seem to be paint versus enamel. Brain... hurts!

Trying NOT to confuse things more, the silver I started a separate thread for appears to be ACTUAL silver, or at least heavily silver plated, as opposed to the very shiny bright silver-colored ones seen in this thread. Were I to buff off its patina with polish, it would be the "gray" of silver rather than the "chrome" I have seen here.

Do you want to combine EVERYTHING into this thread on all classes of all types, or try to keep things distinct?

[Gordon Craig]

Rick,

I think we would have been better served had this thread stayed with my original intention and just focused on the bronze class. Lots of threads run all over the place and are filled with great info but it is often impossible to retreive this useful information later because of the scattered content of the thread. Lets leave this one the way it is and try to focus on your thread with only information related to the silver class.

Regards,

Gordon

[Guest Rick Research]

Aha. Going over these, I detect a distinct difference in the red center stars--

the Model 1985s have a pronounced center dot under the enamel and very sharp center "spines" running out the middles of each arm of the stars. Call that the "starfish?"

Before 1985 the pattern under the red enamel is less defined and almost random looking-- call that kind the "strawberry?"

Check out the closeups in posts # 6, 27, and 37 and compare the M1985 stars with the earlier ones.

Have I just made an amazing discovery?

[Ed_Haynes]

Woo.

Do we need separete threads for each class (metal)?

[Ulsterman]

Aha. Going over these, I detect a distinct difference in the red center stars--

the Model 1985s have a pronounced center dot under the enamel and very sharp center "spines" running out the middles of each arm of the stars. Call that the "starfish?"

Before 1985 the pattern under the red enamel is less defined and almost random looking-- call that kind the "strawberry?"

Check out the closeups in posts # 6, 27, and 37 and compare the M1985 stars with the earlier ones.

Have I just made an amazing discovery?

perhaps- I never noticed, but I never looked. What does Hunyadi say? An article in the making.....?

[Guest Rick Research]

Additional after staring and staring at these-- and only having my mutant silver(-plated?) M1964--

Gordon (bronze i9n posts #1,2) and Ed (gold in post #32)-- can you confirm that the STARS on your flat back, separate hammer and torch, 1 rivet, "strawberry" pattern stars are also cold enamel paint like the white background? They sure look more like cold enamel than the sparkling translucent hot enamel in the ? earlier 3 rivet reverse and dished reverse "starfish" pattern starred M1985s. The stars on both of those types--earlier and later-- appear to be hot enamel on enamel-paint white backing.

So perhaps there was some sort of budget crunch in the MIDDLE of those types?

It would seem from manufacturing logic that the 1 rivet magically attached (no visible connection) 2 piece reverse types which we can safely state were first (pre-1964) were followed by the more secure 3 rivet type, simplified down to the solid one piece reverse (which still had separate hammer and torch) to the final true 1 piece, dished reverse M1985s.

[hunyadi]

My head is hurting with all these 'types'. Rick I like your terminology, but I also like the Type 1.0, Type 1.1 'strawberry' etc...Anyhow can we make a list?

my suggestion

1.0 (16 ray variety)

1.1 stamped reverse with date

1.2 stamped reverse w/o date

1.3 two piece solid single rivet for star

etc...

2.0 (32 ray)

2.1 three piece riveted

2.2 one piece

2.3 one piece dished

we can add the sub variants of 1948, 1953, 1954, 1964, 1985 etc...

just my suggestion...

[Gordon Craig]

Gents,

I like the numbered system Charles has suggested with the name beside it. Even if I just used it myself to keep some sort of order in the different variations that are available in the Order of Labour. On the other hand, are we making something that is very simple into something very complicated? A thread on bronze, silver and gold would serve the purposes of most collectors who use the forum. Most of us will only see the readily available medals but it would help to know that there are some of a certain type of construction that have a number on the back and some without the number etc. In other words, there were more variations produced than those that actually appear in the reference books now in print. Perhaps what we need to do is clean up the bronze and silver threads so that they only contain medals in that class and start a gold thread for that class. After all, we are not dealing with an exceptionally rare or expensive medal here. Would the time involved in setting up a complicated system to identify variations be worth it? Wouldn't that time be better spent researching the different variations and sharing this research with the forum members? Just my two cents worth while I take a break from housework!

Regards,

Gordon

[hunyadi]

I think the best thing to do would be to clean up the threads at this point and go from there. We are all very good at finding variations and should share them. It should not be too difficult as from what I can see there are about 10 variations and types in total. Lets start a Gold thread as a model to fix the silver and bronze...????

[Gordon Craig]

Charles,

I agree. Since you have the earliest gold types I think it would be good if you started the gold thread.

Regards,

Gordon

[Ulsterman]

Here's the back of my bronze...usual three piece 1964 era piece-nice though...from Charles? type 2.1

You can just see the bad die job on the ribbon-barely-

Edited January 15, 2008 by Ulsterman

[Gordon Craig]

Well today's coin and stamp show turned up another bronz, 1950 issue Order of Labour. Unfortunately all Charles and I could do was take pictures. The dealer would not sell the medal. It is the same as the one from the catalogue posted in poste #49 of this thread. Two things to knote about this medal. There is no enamel in the centre with the 16 rays and the ribbon. These appear to be made of silk with water marks.

Regards,

Gordon

Edited January 22, 2008 by Gordon Craig

[Gordon Craig]

A closeup of the front of the medal.

[Gordon Craig]

The reverse of the medal.

[Gordon Craig]

A closeup of the reverse.

[Guest Rick Research]

Hmm. Bring to show. Show. Not for sale. Return home.

Interesting business strategy!

What would one--assuming the seller was, uh, selling-- go for these days?

[hunyadi]

This is not the Order of Labor in Bornze, but rather the lowest form - the Labor Merit Medal of 1950

[Ulsterman]

This is not the Order of Labor in Bornze, but rather the lowest form - the Labor Merit Medal of 1950

Really????

That is cool.

How rare are these? Were they replaced by the Kivalo Munkaert medal?

[Gordon Craig]

OOPS! My appologese gentlemen. I learn something new everyday. Which is not that bad, all things considered. Thanks for the correction Charles.

Now to correct my mistake and to try and answer Ulsterman's question.

Really????

That is cool.

How rare are these? Were they replaced by the Kivalo Munkaert medal?

I would say they are rare, although we haven't defined rare versus scarce etc. and I have thought about trying to do that but Charles is in a much better position than I am to do it. In 1953, the Order of Labour replaced the Labor Merit Medal of 1950 and the Workers Medal by making them one. The Order of Labour medal and ribbon were similar to the Labour Merit Medal in design but without the date on the back. I've paraphrased the above from CDs translation of the Order of Labour in the NMK.

Regards,

Gordon