Order of The Badge Of Honor - Researchable?

[Kirchgoens]

I've got a number of documented labor awards from the 60's through 80's from the Uzbek SSR. These pretty strongly indicate that blocks of these awards went down to the republic level, and were given on certain days each year. I've got like awards with very close numbers given on the same days, and I've differing labor awards given on the same day. Thus my theory of blocks of numbers and of "award" days, all at either the republic or oblast level.

Also, I've noticed two different blocks of T1/two-rivet OLG3's that were given in UZ. One is in the 5,xxx area, and the other is in the 135,xxx-143,xxx range, with generally 1975 award dates. I base this on seven UZ-obtained T1's that I have. Two were awarded on the same day in April '75. I figure this adds a bit more to the block and days theories.

So, a broad range of numbers for a single type of award in a given year would probably indicate geographic dispersion more than anything. That might be reinforced by the different ethnicities of the names you list above.

[riley1965]

Originally Posted by Kirchgoens

I've got a number of documented labor awards from the 60's through 80's from the Uzbek SSR. These pretty strongly indicate that blocks of these awards went down to the republic level, and were given on certain days each year. I've got like awards with very close numbers given on the same days, and I've differing labor awards given on the same day. Thus my theory of blocks of numbers and of "award" days, all at either the republic or oblast level.

Also, I've noticed two different blocks of T1/two-rivet OLG3's that were given in UZ. One is in the 5,xxx area, and the other is in the 135,xxx-143,xxx range, with generally 1975 award dates. I base this on seven UZ-obtained T1's that I have. Two were awarded on the same day in April '75. I figure this adds a bit more to the block and days theories.

So, a broad range of numbers for a single type of award in a given year would probably indicate geographic dispersion more than anything. That might be reinforced by the different ethnicities of the names you list above.

This is VERY interesting information!!! Thanks for posting it.
Tony,
It is a dead end for now. From reliable sources the Labour awards may become researchable in the near future. We just have to wait.

Doc

[Nota Bene]

Originally Posted by riley1965

Tony,
I've tried to get my BoH researched. Both researchers that we all know have said that Labour awards are not yet researchable.

Best,
Doc

Doc,

Unfortunately, that's true - labor awards are not researchable, at least not yet

Alexei

[Kirchgoens]

From what I've seen, I suspect there was tremendous award inflation starting in the 60's on labor awards, with recipients almost moving up the ladder in award importance in what almost looks like a similar sort of progression to the old "CSM to ORS to ORB to OL". When I find a later labor group, it often starts with a DL, VL, or OBH, and then moves up to OLG3 or ORBL, and then sometimes up to OFP or OOR. I've got a group that has two OBH's, an ORBL, and an OOR, and these were roughly awarded in precedence order. I've got many two-order groups (minus those OFP's and OOR's) that go in the same order over time.

I bet these were given out on name lists only, and came to the recipients fairly easily. Even if researchable in those last 30 years, I think you'd get a dead-end name with no story for your money.

I am also bettting that the only really researchable labor awards in the future will be those from the 40's and before. Back then, they seem to have not been so easy to come by. In the mid 30's, an OBH seems to have been an object of great pride that came through a lot of hard or distinguished or connected work to fairly senior writers and singers/actors and poets and collective managers, people who would even today have a history you could dig up. As an example, I know a Central Asian guy who is the grandson of one the most famous poets of the Soviet Union. I was recently at a museum in honor of his grandfather, and saw the screwback OBH on his granddad's lapel from 1930's and early wartime photos. I also remember an early wartime photo Ilya Ehrenburg with his screwback OBH.

Also, there were some OBH's awarded in the 30's to NKVD members, including some of the worse interrogators and executioners. This was given a notch below the ORS's and ORB's (and the rare OL) in the NKVD for stuff that ranged from breaking your fellow man into pieces before shooting him to simply being in a position of responsibility during an anniversary such as the founding of border troops. I would imagine some of those might be researable some day, but a very, very large number of those NKVD recipients didn't make it out of the basement when their time came. Thus they would have been stripped of their awards (and those must still be tucked away in an archive somewhere).

...Brian