The official, "unofficial", Party badge thread.

[Jo Rivett]

Hello Chaps.
With all this recent talk on M1/39 having badges made by other sub-contractors and the like, what are your feelings on this one, it certainly looks unique enough to "possibly" be put into the category of actually being "made" by RZM 39 (Beck) What say the masses?

[sandgroper]

I can see differences in all 3 of the "Beck" badges shown here, not sure what that tells me Jo, I need a good reference book on party badges to learn more about them, know where I can get a book like that??.....lol

[slados28]

My observations and concluding layman's theory:

The one Greenhorn posted is clearly the "odd" one out of the three... and, if I'm not entirely mistaken, would be the earliest one. I'm guessing it would have been old stock that was left over and not issued before the rzm came into play, explaining the "after the fact" engraved markings (maybe this "old stock" phenomenon would have had something to do with the relatively slow growth of the party in the earlier/pre-1933 days, thereby increasing the possibility of larger amounts of left over stock due to lower demand... something that in turn shifted post-1933 increasing the chances of old stock being issued due to an obviously higher demand).

The other two examples, posted by myself and sandgroper, are transitional variants with similar looking reverse markings and more streamlined/rzm-era like fonts compared to the quirky earlier one posted by Greenhorn. I'd like to note though, although these two are quite different compared to Greenhorn's example there are also obvious differences in between the two as well... just not as prominent as when compared to the Ges Gesch example.

If I am to theorize I would imagine that there would have been an increasing need for outsourcing (sub-contractors) of badge production when the rzm regulations came into play (late '34- early '35?), due to the diminishing numbers of actual licensed/approved makers coupled with an exponential increase in NSDAP membership numbers, this making it more likely that the ones myself and Sandgroper posted would be sub-contractor made and the more distinct looking earlier badge that Greenhorn posted an actual Robert Beck produced piece...

Hope this made at least some sort of sense...

Again, this is only my humble theory and way of trying to come up with an answer... in reality I have nowhere near the amount of info on this to state something as fact or whatever. I guess a comprehensive reference book is long over due

[slados28]

After thinking about this some more I think sandgroper's rzm 39 gets my most humble vote for sub-contractor made as well, if not for anything else than a gut feeling looking at the overall appearance of the badge coupled with its slightly akward placement of the rzm marking to the reverse... I don't know... just throwing it out there.

[Jo Rivett]

Slado, post 643 touches on many home truths about the Parteiabzeichen, all correct of course, and quite accurate, but, in this case you would be wrong about the time frame and members - relating to when the Transitional period actually was. You would also be wrong about Herr Greens badge, it is indeed a sub-contractor piece, as weird and unique as it is, with it many die flaws and nice background pattern. As i explained a few posts back, the reverse of any badge, the markings, placement of them, size of RZM logo etc, is not what you should look for on a badge (or badges) to see whether it was produced by a sub-contr5actor, only the obverse!

Here we have two badges, (Marks above, marked RZM 39 - GES.GESCH, and mine below marked RZM 25) the reverses are very different, as are RZM logo, placement, size, markings... BUT, as you will observe from the obverse, they were both struck under the identical obverse die stamp. On the enlargements to the right, you will see common die flaws found on both, the long thin line between the L▬S as well as the small row of dots above the L▬S. Die flaws of course being indicative of the identical die and not just a similar die, or even master die. (In this case the die flaws cannot come from the master die because they are found in the actual background pattern, which is not on a master die, so they can only come from the working die)

@Sand... yes, we are almost ready to go to print, so i would imagine that pre-orders will be starting in a few weeks, just keep on checking the B&D publishing site i guess.

[slados28]

Very interesting... the flaws you are pointing out are indeed very telling! This clearly shows that, at least for my part, there's a major lack of info out there on how these badges were actually produced... something that can easily lead to misunderstandings re. the underlying truths behind this sea of variations. I can kind of see how the process would work, a general overview if you will, but on the whole I'm still pretty much in the dark. Too many different types of dies to sort out in my head to make sense of it all.
Well, at least I got some of the general points re. the parteiabzeichen right--- things I hadn't really even thought about before you posed this question, this is why I always cherish in-depth discussions such as this... I learn something new each and every time!

So, yes... infomational and enlightening as always, Jo!

[Adrian Stevenson]

Nice work as ever.

Cheers, Ade.

[Jo Rivett]

... there's a major lack of info out there on how these badges were actually produced...

True, but not just party badges, everything that takes more than one "procedure" to make. Sometimes it can be hard to make a definite connection and "prove, that a sub-contractor had his grubby fingers and toes in every hole - unless you can find matching die flaws, or be certain that the background patterns are identical." The more you use this on "other" awards, the more you will discover that just because it says "Ferdinand Wagner" is no guarantee that Wagner actually "made" that item.

Although the points you raised about the supply & demand issue (pertaining to when they were made, and in what amounts they would have been needed) are very relevant, (more so than you possibly imagine) This whole sub-contracting thing went on before the ZM & RZM period, it went on after the RZM M1/ prefix was introduced as well, after April 1935, in fact it went on all the way through to the end of the Third Reich.

The obverse of both contain other connectiing die flaws as well, on the lettering.

And to be fair, although the placement of the markings are different, the RZM looks the same on both, even though one is impressed, and the other raised.

Nice work as ever.

Cheers, Ade.

Cheers Ade :-)

[Greenhorn]

Slados28

I was in the same mindset as you in thinking it was a Beck original, silly since I have a badge with the same or similar font and should have known better. I bought this badge from Jo and we recently spoke about it. Knowing the answer to Jo's question above I could not answer as I received the answer from Jo. With that said, Slados28 you are not in the dark and have learned lots and learning more, quickly. We all are, for that matter. There are myriads of fonts and like I said before, when you have 30,40,80, etc Party badges, you start to see things that many will not notice, like the similarities in fonts and reverse marking styles and locations. We have learned lots in a rather short time. Jo has been at it much longer, afterall, he is 99.

Mark

[Jo Rivett]

, afterall, he is 99.

A tip fehler :-) one 9 too many :-)