Brilliant when little things tell bigger things. Id like to go back to a Th�ringen Abzeichen a bit. Its surely intrestring all the Abzeichen already learned
here. Now I wanna show a little bit more even, yes the same Abzeichen, but, with a little piece of paper on it, that gives so much more info! The little lable at the back, look at that! Doesnt lit up under UV-light in a dark room, so it looks real! It says "
Arbeitsbeschaffungsstelle der Notstandsgemeinde Mangersgereuth-H�mmern (T�ringen), �ltester Ort deutscher Schiffschnitzerkunst", so, in English, something like "
Employmentservice of the municipality in state of crisis Mangersgereuth-H�mmern in Th�ringen, the place of oldest German shipscarver art traditions". About the Schiffschnitzerkunst,
here is a good read in German about the toymakers and shipcarvers,
little ships, so
Schiffsmodelle mind you!
Just like Berlin and Frankfurt am Main, this place
Mangersgereuth-H�mmern in Th�ringen was a
Notstandsgemeinde. This means, like translated above, that the community is in crisis, with financials at least, and maybe other things too. This ment among very many other things that, the leaders of the community, could use �33 of the
Reichsf�rsorgegrunds�tze and so also the
Arbeitsf�rsorge, to restrict care for people that live, work or visit there to absolute minimum, so, only to help people in severe life-theatening situations. And also, the leaders can force inhabitants to work, if people dont have work, of if they had too little work, or, if the community thinks the person has a skill thats necesary for the comunity. Th�ringen, I said already
here, was the first to use forced and slavelabourers.
Here is more about Pflichtarbeit.
Here is interesting stuff also about public welfare and forced labour. But again in German.
So, this Th�ringen Abzeichen, is realy
not a Tagungsabzeichen, or Veranstaltungsabzeichen. I'm thinking, maybe, the word tinnie needs extra specification, like H�sken already has the Mitgliedsabzeichen, or membership-pin. This seems like a membership-pin too, with a
but... The badge is big and stands out, so, makes it eazy to see, and people wearing it, can be seen as Employment service workers. And I think that people thatgot put to work for the service had to wear these. I dont think, officials that work
at the employment service that put people to work wore these, but also thats possible maybe. Still, membership-pins, are usualy not so screamingly noticeable. Like the little
Hessen-Nassau Abzeichen, that I think is a Mitgliedsabzeichen, no date, no event on it, just KdF and in this case Gau, sometimes pins tell the Kreis. Yep I think this Th�ringen pin, is a workers-badge. Just a theory I have, no pictures to actuly show this (yet?) but, so far, its a good theory.
And theres more. The little piece of paper, look at the print, the typeface, its normal-type. I think, this makes the Abzeichen, of after early 1941. Usually they printed in
Fraktur typeface. This is also not always true, and for exemple
this Hamburg pin uses no Fraktur either, but something normal-type that looks like runic? Still, very much prints used Fraktur, this was the German way of print then.
If we
look back at the M�nchen-Oberbayern Abzeichen, this uses
S�tterlin typeface, that also makes this pin very pretty-looking, S�tterlin is beautiful, just see how pretty this old
school exercise book is! So, this surely dates this pin back to before september 1941! Why? Because, the
S�tterlinschrift, was
banned by Hitler in september 1941. And
Fraktur, was banned a tad earlier, in january 1941. See a scan of the letter to decree the
Fraktur-ban below;
Ironic that the letterhead self still is in Fraktur
Imagine, all printings, letters, books, schoolbooks and stuff, totally anything, needed to get redone into regular type, called
Antiqua what we still use? See
this to see both typefaces together. Surely a big change for printing business then, no? Anyways, awesome how little things make bigger pictures. And, these big Th�ringen Abzeichen, simple as they are I guess, surely look great together somehow
Enjoy,
KR
